


Rise of the Uzumaki Hero

by cisco_centric_4ever



Series: Crossover banana! [2]
Category: Naruto, 盾の勇者の成り上がり - アネコユサギ | Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari | The Rising of the Shield Hero - Aneko Yusagi
Genre: Implied Mpreg, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Multi, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-05
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2020-11-24 17:00:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 30,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20911031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cisco_centric_4ever/pseuds/cisco_centric_4ever
Summary: After failing the genin exams, the village decides that Naruto no longer has any use to them and decides to chase him out of the village to kill him. Naruto manages to escape the villagers somehow and finds a town to lay low in. Soon after, he finds his wanted poster and tries his best not to be found out as he poses as a civilian. On one such day, he goes to the library to do research and is sucked into a book. Literally. The next thing he knows, he's in a new world, but that's not so bad, right? At least no one knows him here, so no one's trying to kill him...Right?





	1. New beginnings

There is one thing that you should know about Naruto, he hates stupid people.

Period.

Sure he might act like an idiot, but he's not dumb by any means. He knows a fair amount of things on his own. However, when he doesn't know something, he will admit the fact to himself and educate accordingly. The villagers in his village, however, doesn't see a need for him to do that. Not because they think he's smart enough already, but because they don't want him finding out things they don't want him to. Important things like "What to do when you are bitten by a venomous snake?" Or, "how to survive on your own when you're only four-years-old?" You know, the basics. Honestly, they couldn't be bothered to care if he actually made it to the end of each day, not when they were all personally trying to kill him for their own gains. Naruto didn't understand why they did what they did until he was about five when he met the Kyuubi no Kitsune, or Kurama, as he likes to be called. But only by Naruto. 

Naruto grew up learning from the Kitsune and found that he liked hanging out around animals more than actual people. His reason is the same as stated above, he couldn't even bring himself to trust the kids in his own age group. He was sick and tired of how many times he's been hurt by these people that he decided to shut himself out of society as a whole. Naruto went as far as to move into the forest permanently after he turned five to further limit his human interaction as much as possible. Kurama wasn't so sure if that was really a good idea or not, but he couldn't stand the villagers just as much as his container and supported his actions. And why not? This was a perfect opportunity to make the boy strong since he hated having to use his chakra to heal him from the point of death on a daily basis. Naruto's time outside of the forest was spent going to and from the academy through as many back allies and empty streets as he could manage. In school he would try his best to keep up his idiot act, being loud, obnoxious, and overly annoying, when in reality, he was a quiet observer that hated human interaction like the plague. He didn't try to make friends, and no one tried to make friends with him because of their parents, so that wasn't a problem. In the forest, Naruto would learn everything that Kurama taught him, soaking it up like a sponge. When he was only ten, he was three to four levels higher than his classmates. Yet, the skills he learned from Kurama didn't sit well with his sensei, from the age of six to ten he was constantly trying to prove his worth to them but they refused to see reason. So he stopped. Now he was just trying to keep up his act...that is, until he failed the genin exams for the third time in a row.

* * *

"What do you mean I fail? I made three clones!" Naruto shouted angrily.

The two chunin in the room, Iruka and Mizuki, was sitting across from him behind a desk. Both had unimpressed expressions on their faces, "look, Naruto, I can see that you might have tried a little bit." Iruka started, "however, your clones are not the ones that we asked for."

"What does that mean? They're clones!" Naruto shot back, "you asked for at least two and I gave you three! What more do you want from me?"

"That's the thing, Naruto," Mizuki chimed in, "we asked for clones, not _shadow_ clones, there's a difference."

By this point, Naruto had heard enough of their shit to know what was really going on. He's heard the same type of thing before from other instructers that hosted the exam. He was sick of hearing it, so he let them know, "listen, I can't do a regular clone, you all _know _I can't do a regular clone." Naruto folded his arms in front of his chest as he watched both chunin's faces turn to realization, "you both are really dumb, you know that right? I can hear everything that's being said about me behind my back and I have to say, I'm impressed by how dumb you actually think I am without even getting to know me. Not one of you has even tried to get to know me, to find out what and how much I know, no, you are all too content on seeing me fail to bother yourselves with that. So, let me tell you something right now, I know shadow clone jutsu from the Kyuubi. The only sensei that has ever taken the time to get to know me, even though he already knew me before I was born, he still taught me things ten times more useful than you. In fact," he smirked smugly, "he taught me about seals."

This got their attention, both chunin's faces morphed from realization to shock and then mortification. "It what!" Iruka shouted as he got to his feet in a flash, his stance was defensive, clearly, he saw the young boy as more of a threat now.

"Yep, and you know what else?" Naruto's smirk turned evil, "I'm going to release him soon."

"What! How could you!" Iruka shouted in a panic.

Mizuki was shocked as well as he was already getting into a fighting stance by this point. "I won't let you, how do you even know about that thing!" He asked as he reached into his ninja pouch for a weapon as he kept his eye on the container.

Naruto chuckled, "that's for me to know," he put a hand up in a single hand sign, "and you'll never find out," then he disappeared in a cloud of black smoke. 

He left both chunin in a panic. Not wasting time, Mizuki turned to the shocked Iruka, it was clear to see the man was imagining the worst-case scenario. "Iruka, get it together, you have to go and tell the Hokage about this right away. I'll stay here and continue with the exam until you come back."

Iruka paused his panicking for a second to turn to his coworker and nodded, "right." He handed the silver-haired ninja his clipboard with the names of the students in their class, "I'm on my way," and disappeared in a regular cloud of smoke.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

To be continued


	2. Disappearance

It was a regular day in the village, the sun was shining, the birds were singing, blah, blah, blah. It was an ordinary day, so Shikamaru decided to take his time walking to school today. Not that he felt there was any need to rush, it was still early enough that he could walk slowly and still make it to class on time. His mother would probably get annoyed with how slow he was walking, but who cares, as long as he got there, that's all that matters. As Shikamaru was making his way closer to the academy, he noticed something, or someone walking out of the ally just ahead of him. The person had blond hair, a worn-out orange tracksuit, and walked with purpose. "Huh? Naruto, is that you?" Shikamaru asked, but Naruto didn't turn around or even stop at the sound of his name, this wasn't the usual Naruto that Shikamaru was used to seeing in class. In fact, this Naruto sort of seemed like a different person altogether, as if someone had turned off a light switch and all he was looking at was a dim shadow making his way through the streets. Shikamaru stopped in his track as he observed Naruto's squared shoulders and steady stride. _"Somehow, today seems like its a bad day..." _he thought as he picked up his pace again. He followed behind Naruto all the way to school, they were still early so no one had made it to class just yet, so it was only the two of them there for the time being. As soon as they entered the classroom, Naruto made his way to the back row and took a seat near the window and put his head down on the desk. Shikamaru watched him for a second as he took his own seat in the back on the other end of the row, he didn't say anything to him, he didn't even try. There was just something about the blond that made the Nara not want to disturb the silence, so they both sat there, not saying a word to each other for the whole time until people started showing up in the room. As soon as people noticed Naruto, they proceeded to do the usual by excluding him, making fun of him, and the like. As for Naruto, it seemed like someone flipped that switch from off to on because he started acting the way he always did, laughing, smiling, being loud. There was no trace of the Naruto that he saw from that morning, but still, there was still something off about the blond today. 

This wasn't exactly the first time that Shikamaru had seen Naruto this way before. Although it's a rare sight, he had seen Naruto act this way before. Silent, calculating, thoughtful, all the things that he refrained from showing on a daily basis. Chouji had noticed him staring at the resident class clown, he noticed that his best friend seemed to be fond of observing the Uzumaki when he thought no one was looking. In Chouji's opinion, he guessed that Shikamaru was either curious about something involving the blond, or he was interested in the blond himself. Shikamaru never answers him clearly whenever he asked him directly, so this was the best that Chouji could come up with from what he's seen with his own eyes. Shikamaru, in the beginning, didn't want to admit it, but after so many years of watching Naruto silently from the corner of his eyes, he was finally able to come to terms with his feelings. He liked Naruto, more than he thought was normal, he wanted to ask his mom about it, but she made it clear that she was expecting him to marry a girl when he grew up. He was the heir to a clan, after all, he was expected to have an heir of his own one day soon, but hopefully not too soon. Shikamaru was about nine or ten when he realized that he liked Naruto, he was even younger when he realized that he liked boys at all. For the moment, only Chouji knows this fact about him and that's how he wanted it to stay, but being the smart kid he is, Shikamaru knew that one day, others would find out. Knowing that one day the people around will know that he was different from the other boys his age kind of gave Shikamaru a bit of anxiety. Since the village was a shinobi one, most, if not all the main working force has some sort of connection to the shinobi faction. Merchants who used to work in the field, councilors who were ninja retirees, so on. Not to mention that the shinobi field is heavily lined with death, it's not something that they're taught in school, but any kid from a shinobi family or clan knows this fact from an early age. The children who come from these types of families are taught how to survive in the ninja world, all their families can do after that is hope that they taught them well enough. It's also very common for young ninjas to die early for any and all reasons either during or after they take their first mission.

It's become a fact of life in the village, that's why many people who want their kid to become ninjas enroll their child much earlier than in normal schools. The way the schooling system worked in a ninja village is that parents from ninja clans can enroll their child into preschool from ages two to three. Some parents, like Shikamaru's, are allowed to enroll their child early going as young as one year old, but only if the child shows an affinity for fast learning. However, those children would have to spend an extra year in preschool so that they don't enter the academy too young, it wasn't until after Shikamaru's second year in preschool did he realize this and started to become lazy in his working habits. Of course, he still did enough to pass, and only that much less he gets skipped up a grade after reaching the academy. It was also during his second year of preschool did he meet Naruto, and it was his second day of meeting the blond did he notice the tension of the people around him. That was probably when he started watching the young blond container, he was curious about him, and he was curious about his situation. Shikamaru tried asking his parents about it once but they avoided the subject effectively enough for him to stop asking, but not so much to his curiosity from growing. From then on, he watched Naruto through the years and eventually fell in love with him. And this is where Shikamaru's biggest dilemma began, to make a long story short... there was no positive view on gay marriage within the village. Of course, once you graduated from the academy at age twelve and became a genin you are granted the freedom to do anything that an adult can do.

  * Drinking at bars
  * Smoking
  * Entering the Redlight District whenever you want (although you still need an ID that said you were a ninja to get in at that age)
  * You can even get married young and adopt children

This was because being a ninja at a young age was stressful, so the council, with the Hokage's blessing, allowed this decree to pass. With that said, even though these things were allowed, and supported by many, the views on gay relationships were a little less supported. They were tolerated to a degree, it wasn't a crime or anything, although many of these kinds of couples tend to keep their relationships secret from others. It's especially frowned upon among the clans since many of them want their bloodlines to be passed down, so you wouldn't hear very many stories of clansmen who were able to get married openly. Although Shikamaru does know of a select few who were exempt from the judgment, their relationships were still tightly guarded from the public. Which is why Shikamaru only trust Chouji with this secret of his. Still, it was getting close and closer to the time when their class would be graduating the academy soon, Shikamaru had heard rumors of how some people wanted Naruto to fail the exam and not become a ninja. He didn't know why the villagers hated Naruto so much, all he ever did was pull some harmless pranks here and there, but he had heard some people going so far as wishing for Naruto's death. He heard this multiple times, to the point that it started to worry the Nara heir. Even if he could display his affections publicly, he at least wanted to show Naruto that there was at least one person on his side, which is why Shikamaru was going to make sure that Naruto passed the exam. But first, he needed to get close to the blond, he didn't know how to do that at first but figured that a simple gesture of kindness should get him into the blond's good graces, right? 

* * *

Shikamaru made his way down the street after school that same day. He decided on inviting Naruto over to the park to play a game of shogi where he could get a chance to talk to him. He would go home to get his shogi board, but then he remembered that Ino had broken it the day before when she got carried away yelling at him and Chouji for being lazy. Honestly, if it wasn't for the fact that their fathers were old teammates and best friends, he would never hang out with the likes of her. Anyways, as Shikamaru was making his way over to the game store, there was another store that caught his eye, it looked to have just opened too. He paused his walked and went inside, the shop keeper greeted him, letting him know that the store was an antic shop and everything was half off since it was their grand opening. Shikamaru took this opportunity to look around the store, it was interesting to see if there were any old scrolls that would catch his eye, he may not like studying in front of others, but he did like it. It didn't take him too long to find the literature section, looking throw the shelves, he saw a book that looked to have been carelessly placed in the wrong section. Curious, he picked up the book and read the title, 'Sheild Hero Strategy Guide', his curiosity peaked and he opened the book, "huh? It's empty?" He flipped through the pages but they were all empty, "why-" he forgot what he was going to say when the pages in his hands started to glow brightly, at the same time, he felt something pulling him towards something. The light of the book was getting brighter and brighter but he couldn't throw the book away, he closed his eyes when the light became too much form. 

When Shikamaru opened his eyes again, he was no longer inside the antic shop anymore. Instead, he was standing in a field somewhere he didn't recognize. There was something about the air that smelled differently too. Shikamaru turned around to see if there were some building nearby that he would recognize, he did spot a structure, however, it was not one that he knew. It was tall and made of stone bricks from the looks of it, it was most likely a wall of some kind. Looking closely along the wall, he noticed an opening in the wall nearby that looked to be the entrance, "well...I guess I might be dreaming, but I'm sure I woke before class ended, then I came upon that shop. So...why would I be here?" He looked around his surroundings in all directions to see if there was any structures he did recognize, sadly, that didn't seem to be the case so he turned back to the stone wall, "I guess this is my only option for now." He stepped towards the opening in the when he noticed that the book was still in his hands, he looked down at the first page to see a single sentence had appeared at the top of the page. 

_Even though the roads are tough, real justice will always shine through, even if others chose not to see. _

"That wasn't there before...hm, okay, so," Shikamaru looked up at the wall again. It was strong, it looked like it held something great inside, yet, he was getting the feeling that whatever was beyond those walls would be troublesome. He sighed deeply, "well, I won't be getting anything done by just standing here, maybe I'll find a way back in there," with that said, he made his way over to the wall hoping for the best.


	3. The Kingdom of troubles

"Shikamaru, time for dinner!" Yoshino called to her son but he didn't answer, "Shikamaru!" Still no answer, she didn't want to call him down a second time, so she decided to bring him down from his room herself. On days like these, when she has to be out of the house for most of the day, she doesn't know when her son and husband get home until its time for dinner, but Shikaku had already called her and told her that he would be coming home tonight. Apparently, there was a mission that the Hokage thought Shikaku's team could get done quickly so he would be gone for, at most, three days if not more, that meant that it would just be her and Shikamaru for those few days. Yoshino walked up the steps to her son's room and knocked on it, no answer, she was getting tired of this, _"he can't seriously still be sleeping, could he?"_ She thought to herself, with that thought, she slammed the door open, not hard enough for it to break the door or leave a dent in the wall, just enough to name a loud noise. But she was sure that after doing this for so many years there was surely a dent somewhere on the wall by now. Shikamaru's room wasn't as dirty as other boys' rooms would be, so it was easy to get around the few pieces of clothes that were laying on the floor. The bed was a mess as well, Yoshino sighed, she doesn't know how many times she's told him to make his bed whenever he got up in the morning, "alright Shikamaru, you've slept long enough, come and have some dinner," she said before she ripped the covers from off the bed. However, the only thing under the covers was a pillow and an orange fox plushie he won at the Kyuubi Festival when he was about eight or nine. "He still sleeps with that thing?" She frowned, usually people would buy or win these plushies at the festival to burn it at the end of the night as a symbol of their Fourth Hokage defeating the fox all those years ago. Yet, Shikamaru still had this one that she saw him win from that one festival, "oh well, I'll just leave it for now, maybe he has a thing for stuffed toys? That's odd, I wouldn't think he would...hmm."

Yoshino since Shikamaru wasn't in bed, he might have sensed her coming and hide somewhere, so with that thought, she looked around his room. To her surprise, when she checked his closet, a mountain of different colored fox plushies fell out on top of her. There were different sizes, one even looked to be about as big as two years old child, "honestly, what is all this?" She gasped, "wait, is this some kind of fetish?!" She looked down at all the fox plushies that were scattered all over the floor, her mind started thinking of all the strange things that her son could be doing with so many of them that it started to worry her. "No! No, no, I have to think clearly," Yoshino shook her head and got to her feet, "it can't be that bad, Shikamaru's not like that." She looked down at all the toys with a frown, "hmm, okay, we'll just talk about it when he gets home, but first, I need to find him. But before that..." Yoshino picked up all the plushies on the floor, and gathered up all the clothes on the floor to wash them, she made his bed and then neatly placed every last fox plushie she found in his closet on his bed. The number of plushies almost took up more than half the bed, but it wasn't the weirdest thing that she's known a ninja to be addicted to, if he was only collecting them, then it would be fine, right? With Shikamaru's room now clean, she continued her search for her son, because if he wasn't sleeping in his room, naturally he would hide and fall asleep in one of the other rooms in the house. He's done it before whenever he didn't want to be found to do chores right away. Thus began Yoshino's search for her son, the next place she checked was her and her husband's room, the guest rooms, the living room, family, dining room, and kitchen, but he wasn't there either. Next, she checked outside, the porch, the front and back yard, and then the kitchen one more time, just in case he somehow snuck in while she was looking elsewhere, but she couldn't find him anywhere at home. Yoshino was starting to wonder if this was some kind of game her son was playing on her, she was going to be very upset if that was the case, "well, if he's not at home, then he must still be out." Now Yoshino decided to check all the other places that she knew her son would go to kill time or hide. She checked the forest where he liked to sleep, the park where he liked to watch clouds, and sleep, the other part of the forest he liked to sleep, the Akamichi compound, the Yamanaka compound, but Shikamaru wasn't there either. 

"Where is he?" Yoshino was starting to get really worried now, "wait, there's one place let." Even though it was starting to get dark out Yoshino ran over to the academy as quickly as she could. She was just in time to catch Iruka and Mizuki walking out of gates for the academy. "Iruka, Mizuki, pardon me but have either of you seen Shikamaru today?" She asked she knew that she woke him up for school and he left after breakfast, but after a visiting Chouji, he found that Shikamaru was the last person to leave school that day. Usually, Shikamaru would walk home with Chouji after school, sometimes they would go by Ino's home for a time before going home. But Shikamaru didn't do any of that today, so she was curious.

"Um, yes," Iruka replied, "Shikamaru was here today, he acted, as usual, sleeping in class again." He scratched his head, he didn't want to get one of his good students into trouble with their parents, but Yoshino's worried face made him spill the tea without a second thought. "I did see that he was the last one to leave class today, so I thought that he would have made it home by now, maybe he's with one of his friends at their house. I know that he likes to hang out with Kiba sometimes."

"With Kiba?" Yoshino asked, "hm, I could check there, okay, thank you, sorry to bother you two." She bowed and left, heading in the direction of the Inuzuka compound. 

"What's that about, Shikamaru hasn't gone home yet?" Mizuki asked as he stepped closer to Iruka and watched the Nara woman leave.

"No, it doesn't seem like it," Iruka answered, "I hope nothing serious has happened."

"Yeah," Mizuki agreed and the two senseis went on their own way.

* * *

**One week later**

It has already been a week since Yoshino had started looking for Shikamaru. She checked everywhere she could, the game shop that he seemed to like to buy his shogi board from. The book stores, the library, everywhere that she could think of, she would go there looking for him, but never found him. It's already been a whole week since he disappeared and no one has seen him since that day. Shikaku had returned from his mission three days later only to find his wife crying in the kitchen, when he asked what was wrong, he was shocked to hear that his son was missing. No one had seen him for a whole week, something like this has never happened before in the village's history, it surely was a first. What made the situation even more worrying was that Shikamaru wasn't even a genin yet, so that meant that the young heir had somehow disappeared from a well-guarded shinobi village without anyone knowing about. Shikaku did some looking around for himself and found that the last place anyone had seen Shikamaru at was the new antic shop that opened two stores down from the game shop Shikamaru liked going to. The shop owner was questioned and he told them that after he welcomed Shikamaru to the shop, the boy went directly over to the literature section, after that, the owner just assumed that the boy left without him knowing. Back then, the owner didn't put up a bell on the door yet, so he didn't know if anyone had left or entered the store while he was still unpacking his boxes in the back. After finding that out, Shikaku asked to search the shop himself, the owner agreed since he didn't want to be wrongfully charged with anything. No clues were found about where Shikamaru had gone to after that, the trail seemed to run cold fast once the shop was cleared of any suspicion, and the grieving parents were left to search elsewhere once more.

Of course, since time continues to flow, the genin exams came and went. The Hokage promised that since Shikamaru's disappearance was so sudden when the boy was found again, he would be allowed to take the exam and become a ninja after recovering. Shikaku and Yoshino were grateful because they knew that their son deserved to become a ninja because of the skills he keeps hidden, however, that would not help them find their son any quicker. On the same day of the genin exams, news about Naruto's declaration sparked an uproar among the ninjas, and eventually, it leaked to the civilian masses that immediately charged towards the Sandime Hokage demanding that the 'demon must be put down'. With so many people demanding it, it didn't take any time at all for Shikamaru's disappearance to be placed on the innocent blond. Parties were organized to find and capture the young container so that they could bring him up on the false charges that they pinned on him. Every minute that passed by, more charges were placed on Naruto's head to the point that it would be near impossible for him to talk his way out of the amount of trouble he was in. Naruto's biggest charge turned from making a fellow academy student disappear to kidnapping a clan heir, to murdering said heir. By the time the skies turned dark that same day, the whole village was out searching for Naruto, pitchforks, and torches in hand, they had dogs ready to sniff out the boy as well. Things seemed to be way out of Hiruzen's hands, so to appease the masses, he allowed them to hunt the boy down, but he forbid any of them to kill him. This seemed to somewhat satisfy most of them and thus, the search for Naruto began.

* * *

**Meanwhile**

Naruto was in the woods on the outskirts of the village. After he declared that he was going to release the Kyuubi, Naruto shushined out of the exam room and landed in the forest of training ground thirteen. It was the most dangerous place in the village so not many people went there. He stayed there for a little while until one of the animals he's become familiar with came to him frantically. One of the abilities that Naruto got while learning under the Kyuubi was the ability to talk to animals. Of course, this skill had to be learned, it didn't magically appear like in some fantasy world anime, after talking with some of the other animals in the forest, he found out that people were looking for him. It didn't seem like it was any small group either, but a much larger group than usual. Seeing that there was no way out of this, Naruto picked up his things, packing them away in sealing scrolls, and left the forest after saying goodbye to some of his friends that were the original residents of the training ground. The animals wished him luck and he left the training ground, he managed to sneak out of the village and was waiting for nightfall to make his escape. He needed to wait until the guards changed shifts before he could his escape away from the surrounding area, the was more likely ANBU laying in wait for him as well. "Man this blows, why are so many of them coming after me now? I didn't even d anything today, all I did was tell them something small and they act up like this?" Naruto sighed tiredly, "it's like they don't have brains to think properly."

"Hahaha, if those humans actually had brains, then it would be great. But lower forms like them tend not to think things through, you should know that, kit." Naruto turned around to see a boy that looked around his age walking out of the shadows. The boy had long red hair, red eyes, pale skin, and wore a red yukata with a yellow obi around his waist, he walked over to Naruto barefoot since he didn't like shoes. "Let's hurry and leave this place, the scent of these dumb humans are making me sick."

Naruto chuckled, "did you forget who you're sealed inside of, Kurama? I'm also a human just like those idiots, regrettably so."

The boy, now known as Kurama, sneered, "that might have been true at one point, but you have already transcended those asswholes." He folded his arms in front of his chest as he glared at the blond, "don't ever let me hear you compare yourself to those weaklings ever again. Besides, you're my kit, after all the things I've put you through, you're not much of a human anymore."

Naruto chuckled, "yeah, yeah, I know, Kurama-nii, don't remind me." The blond leaned back on a tree and looked out at the edge of the forest, the village gates and the guard box was started to have movement. "Looks like they're going to be on to us in a few," he turned to Kurama, should we go now?"

Kurama nodded, "yes," the redhead pulled his hair back into a high ponytail that allowed his fox ears to stick out even more. He turned away from Naruto, his bushy tail swaying from side to side, "I don't mind see what these pathetic humans are capable of at their level." He glanced back at Naruto, "let's make them work for their reward, but if they catch you, kit, I will be highly upset with you." With that Kurama faced forward and jumped into the darkness of the woods.

Naruto pushed himself off the tree, a smirk on his face, "I wouldn't dream of it," he followed Kurama and disappeared into the darkness as well.

**To be continued...**


	4. Isekai'd

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to do a small change in this chapter to match the vision I had for the plot.

Naruto has never liked being chased by the stupid mob of villagers that came after him almost every day. He would run from them at a much slower sleep so that they would think that he was weak, but he would never allow them to catch him, never, it would be an embarrassment to Kurama's training. He would some times slow down to the point that they would think they would have a chance, but then he would speed up and leave them in his dust so suddenly their heads would spin. Some times they would try to corner him, but he would make them think that they got the real him, when actually, it was only a shadow clone. Naruto was tired of being chased all the time by the villagers. It was borning. When he got chased by a shinobi, that was a little less boring. Even though he was tired of being chased all the time now, he was used to it to the point that he was expecting it now. Then again, the situation that he found himself in now was different, he was outside of the village. He was never allowed to be chased out of the village before, but on the night he left, the security had been so lax that it was too easy for him to slip right through. Although he would have preferred to be let out of the village under the guise of a mission of sorts, this wasn't so bad. He was currently laying low in a village far from the leaf village. He was dressed like a regular kid with dark brown air, brown eyes, an tan skin. He didn't stick out as much as he did before with his bright blond hair and bright blue eyes, of course, the thing that really made him stand out before was that horrid jumpsuit. He didn't know how he was able to stand wearing that thing everyday especially after finding it in the dumpster when he was about seven after his previous clothes had been ripped beyond repair. Now he was happy to only have a white t-shirt, blue jeans, and a black zip-up hoodie with brown sandals. If he had an outfit like this before, he would have found being able to move around the village in broad daylight without anyone spotting him ten times easier. Although, since he had to wear that stupid orange thing for years, he became a wiz at sneaking around in such an obnoxious color that even the jonin had trouble noticing him during some of his pranks. Honestly, he was even able to pain the faces of the Hokage mountain in that ugly thing. He didn't want to brag too much, but he had to admit that it was fun, so he supposed that wearing that jumpsuit wasn't as bad as he thought.

Still, he was free now, there was no turning back now.

Even if he went back to try to explain his side of the story, he highly doubted that anyone would really listen to him. Either way, the village was behind him now. "Hey, Kurama, I'm going to the library, you coming?"

The red-haired boy laying about on a tree branch turned to the disguised blond. "What are you going to do there?" He asked as he yawned and jumped down from the high branch with ease.

"I donno, I was thinking that I kill some time there, maybe find some work so we can sleep indoors tonight. Who knows," Naruto stated with a shrug of his shoulders. It had been about a week since Naruto left the village with Kurama during the dead night. So far they had been living in the forest avoiding all of the patrols that got close to their location until they found the village that they were currently in now. They didn't have any money on them to buy food or sleep inside, however, the weather had been kind to them so it hasn't rained in a while, but Naruto was getting tired of sleeping outside. It was easy to hunt for food since both of them had enough skill to get any animal they wanted, but still, sleeping in the under the stars was starting to get old.

Kurama stretched his arms to the sky as he thought. "Hm, okay, we could go, I can use the couch inside as a bed while you look around," he stated as he followed Naruto towards the village entrance. "If you find anything interesting, let me know, although I doubt they have anything that will pique my interest."

"Maybe," Naruto stepped in front of Kurama and held out a bag to him.

Kurama looked at the bag and then at Naruto, "what's this?"

"Clothes. You're still wearing your yukata and no one else in this village is wearing one, you might stand out." Naruto explained, "and maybe you should dim the color of your hair too, I haven't seen any red-heads while I was walking around, so you'll definitely stand out more like that too."

"Hmph, and here I thought you liked my hair being so red. You said it reminded you of blood," Kurama stated as he took the bag from Naruto. Inside he found blue jean shorts, a black hoodie that looked two sizes too big for his current form, and some sunglasses. Kurama held up the sunglasses, "and what are these for?"

"To hide your eyes, even if your hair was natural, your eyes aren't." Naruto stated, "even though you're eyes are pretty like rubies, I can't have anyone spotting us and singling you out because of how you look, we're trying to lay low, remember?"

Kurama sighed, he knew his container had a point. "Fine, whatever," he dropped the bag on the floor and stripped himself of his red yukata. He slipped on the jean shorts that came down a little above the knee, he put on the hoodie next which came down below his knee. Essentially he looked like he was a kid playing dress-up in his parent's clothes, he gave Naruto a disapproving look.

Naruto shrugged his shoulders at the fox's glare, "what? It was either this or a party dress and I know you wouldn't want to be walking around in something like that. It was orange," he whispered the last part as if it were a secret.

Kurama shivered at the thought of having that overly right color near him again. "Fine, I will accept this time," he put on the sunglasses, "let's go." Naruto chuckled at his appearance, "what's so funny!"

"Pfft, nothing, nothing. It's just kind of looks like your some kind of runaway delinquent or something," Naruto chuckled some more as he dodged a punch from Kurama.

"Damn brat, hurry up or else." Kurama marched over to the village gates before pausing for a second then turning back to the disguised blond. "You owe me meat tonight!" Then he continued on into the village.

Naruto chucked more as he followed behind the redhead, "whatever you say, sensei!" The duo walked into the civilian village without fail, no one knew them or recognized them, so it was easy to move around freely. They had been coming to this village for a few days now and Naruto could happily say that the humans here seemed reasonably nice. He wouldn't put it past them to attack him if they knew who he was and what Kurama was, thankfully there wasn't a ninja insight of this village. Yet, it was was only a matter of time before one of the leaf ninjas showed up here trying to catch his scent or something, not that he will make it easy for them to catch him. Nevertheless, he would worry about that when the time came, for now, they had arrived at the village library. The duo went inside and Naruto quickly found a section that he liked and started looking through the books for a title that jumped out at him while Kurama found a nearby couch to nap on. It didn't take long before Naruto find a book, the one he found had a strange glow about it, it seemed to be glowing a bright yellow light that caught his eye. He picked it up off the shelf and read the title, "hm, 'The Four Legendary Heros' huh?" He opened the book and started to skim some of the pages of the other heroes, there was a spear hearo, a sword hero, and an archer. When he got to the shield hero, he didn't find a whole lot about him, the most that were written about this hero was that he supported and helped the other heroes. Nothing great, "well that sucks, I kind of feel bad for this guy."

"Whatcha reading?" Kurama asked walking up behind Naruto and threw his arms over the boy's shoulders as he leaned his weight on him. He looked over the boy's shoulders to look at the book, "shield hero? Why'd a ninja look you be reading about something as pointless as that? Haven't I trained you well enough for your age?"

Naruto rolled his eyes, he didn't like it when the fox became clingy like this when he was cranky. "I'm just looking through it, and didn't you say that you were going to take a name? What happened to the couch?"

"It's too hard to get comfortable on," Kurama complained as he leaned more of his weight on the boy. "Let me use you as a pillow for a while, I'm tired," he stated as he nuzzled his head into Naruto's neck.

"Really, you're such a child sometimes," Naruto comments.

"I don't need to hear that from the one of us who is an actual child here, Naru-chan," Kurama shot back using Naruto's nickname.

"Hey, didn't I say not to call me that in public!" Naruto blushed as he looked around to make sure that no one around them noticed what the redhead said. But no one was around at the moment, "get off, you're heavy."

"Whatever, by the way, can you turn off that light, it's starting to hurt my eyes," Kurama comment but didn't move from his position.

"Light?" Naruto turned his attention back to Kurama wondering what he was talking about until he noticed the book in his hand was giving off a blinding light. "What the-" before he could say anything else, the light suddenly got even brighter and in a blink of an eye.

* * *

The next thing he knew, he was falling to the ground on his butt. His right arm felt a slight bit heavier than usual when he looked to see why he saw a shield-like armor attached to his arm. "Wha?" He knew he didn't have anything remotely like this on before, so why now all of a sudden, was what he was thinking when he heard someone speak.

"Oh good, the summoning was successful!" Naruto looked up to see a guy standing in front of a group wearing matching clothes. Since Naruto didn't know what was going on here, he decided to stay quiet and observe the room. As he did, he noticed that there were three other people there with him. One was a boy with black hair that looked to be around fifteen holding a sword. One was a boy with brown hair that looked to be around the same age as the first, he was holding a bow. And the last one was blond, he seemed to be the oldest, he was a spear. From the looks of things, it seemed that he was the youngest person there for whatever reason. As he went along with everything that was happening, he noticed that the others around him were talking in a strange accent that was slowly fading away the more they talked, or at least it sounded strange from where he was sitting. "Hero's, won't you please save our would from pure evil?" Asked the guy that seemed to be the leader of the group of clocked individuals.

The three others that appeared on what looked like a complicated summoning circle with Naruto got to their feet. Naruto got to his feet as well and remained silent as they talked instead. He wanted to get as much information as he could from them and he's found the best way to do that was to wait and listen. From what he could tell, these three guys seemed to be kind of rude, but at the same time, they were summoned to a strange place without their permission. But they didn't mean that they had to act so high and mighty either. They were demanding to be paid without doing any work, they also did want to hear what the guy in front of them had to say, only making demand after demand. If they were ninjas, they would have been seen as lazy, defiant and disobedient subordinates, Naruto wasn't looking forward to spending too much time with any of them. The gay before them started talking again, trying to explain that they could take their demands up with the king of their kingdom called 'Meromark' or something like that. Naruto thought it sounded like a strange name, but he guessed that it was only because he was in a strange place. After hearing about the king, the other three decided to tone done their hostilities in order to follow the guy that summoned them to meet the king. As they walked up the stairs to reach the exit, Naruto looked out the window and saw buildings that looked much different than the ones he was used to seeing in the village, "where is this place exactly? I've never seen buildings like that before," Naruto stated as he briefly paused on the steps behind everyone else.

"This place has a distinctly Mediterranean vibe to it, so I would say that's where we are," stated the guy with the sword.

Naruto had never heard of that world before but went along with it, "uh, sure." From there, they continued walking to the room where the king would be waiting. Naruto guessed that the king here was what a daimyo or feudal lord was back in his world. As they walked, he could feel that there were eyes on him, he looked up to the tall building that they were entering but couldn't see anyone who was obviously watching them from that distance, but he knew someone was watching them. Or was it just him? Who knows, but this fact was enough to put him on alert.

When they ented the room, the kind introduced himself. "I am Aultcray Malromark the thirty-second, please introduce yourself."

The boy with the sword went first, "I am Ren, I'm a high schooler and I'm sixteen."

The boy with the spear went next, "my names, Motoyasu, college student, twenty-one."

"I suppose I'm up next," stated the one with the bow. "I am Itsuki, high school student, seventeen."

"And I am-" Naruto started but the king cut him off. _"Hm, seems like the king is just as rude as them, or maybe he's in a hurry or something? Still, I wouldn't know, but Kurama told me that nobles listen before they speak so they can make calculated desition to benefit them and their land. I guess the nobles here are taught differently than the ones back home. Or he's just rude, yeah, I'll go with that for now," _he thought as the king explained things about what was going on in this world and why they were summoned. As the king explained, Naruto noticed that he didn't spare him not even one glance as he spoke, this gave Naruto and idea of what kind of guy this king really was. From what the Aultcray explained, it seemed like this world was under attack by something called a 'Wave' that seemed to be a curse on their land. If the Waves aren't stopped, the world will end, before they were summoned, a Wave washed over their land and would have wiped them out if not for the local knights and passing adventurers. The four heroes were something created long ago, four people who wield pacific weapons in order to fight evil and aid the kingdom. From what Naruto could tell just by judging the looks on everyone's face, he, the shield hero, was an eyesore. They probably didn't want him here but had to deal with him anyway because he was about of the four. He may not like being around people very much, but he's observed their nasty behaviors enough to know when something stunk. And the position he appeared to be in here at the moment smelled real bad. There is a thing called a 'Dragon Clock' that counted down the time before the next attack, there was also something called a 'statues' or something that Naruto wasn't really following. It all seemed so bizarre to him that he had no words to explain it to himself in his own words, he was at a loss, "what's a 'status'?" Everyone in the room seemed to look at him as if he was an idiot or something for not knowing, _"this is going to get annoying too quickly if things keep going like this," _he thought. 

"Uhm, yeah, what is it?" Itsuki asked, making Naruto feel less excluded.

"Are you guys dense, it should have been the first thing you guys noticed when you got here," Ren stated. He then explained it to everyone in a very Sasuke Uchiha way that made Naruto wonder if the two might be related somehow through dimensions or something.

Naruto looked at the corner of his eye and saw a little thing that wouldn't go away when he blinked. Like when you suddenly see spots in your eyes after a flash of light, only it was only one spot on the lower right corner of his vision. He mentally clicked on it and was surprised when something appeared in front of his face like a computer screen. Naruto had only used a computer once in secret while he was still at the orphanage before he was wrongfully locked out around four and had to live on the streets. It looked like a shart that held readings of his current status, _"seems like a game somehow now that I've seen this, but it's not." _ They were told that they would be using something called 'statues magic', they were also told that they would need to adventure separately or else their weapons will not work well around each other. Naruto thought that this added information was interesting and gave him a little hope for where to start things off when the time comes. However, something still felt off about the situation, he wanted to know what it was, but a small part of him, the part that was still holding just the tiniest hope in humankind. That part of him wanted more than anything for things to be different from what they were like back in his world. When everything was said and done, a made came over to show them to their rooms and to have dinner. Naruto followed the other heroes to the dining hall and then up to their rooms where they stayed up talking for a while. Naruto didn't really care to hand out with these guys for so long after he witnessed how rude they all were, but still, he was curious about these guys. He wanted to know where they came from because he was sure that they didn't come from his world, even if he was sure that the civilians in his world would develop high-end fashion that he could only imagine. Yet, these three, Motoyasu, Itsuki, and Ren, all had an air about that that was unlike anyone he's met before. He could tell that they were curious about him too because they kept glancing at him throughout dinner. When they entered the room and the door was closed, he came out and asked, "okay, what'd ya want to know?"

"Huh, what are you talking about little one?" Itsuki asked seeing how they had only just entered the room.

"At dinner, you guys were all glancing at me. I want to know why," Naruto stated, "is it because I'm the youngest one here?"

"You're the youngest? I thought you were simply just short," Ren stated bluntly.

"The only reason I'm so short is that I'm twelve, I'm still growing," Naruto started walking over to the chair closet to the window.

"Twelve?!" All three said in unions, not believing what they heard.

"Maybe they must have messed up their spell or something somehow. There's no way that a kid that young can play a game like this," Itsuki theories. The other two nodded their heads, seeming to agree with that logic.

"What's that even supposed to mean? Is this really just a game to you guys?" Naruto asked sitting down on the couch, 

"Of course it's! This is similar to an online game I was playing," Motoyasu commented confidently.

"I think you're mistaken, you mean this is a console game that just went on sale," Itsuki replied.

"No, this is a VRMMO game that just launched," Ren stated in a matter of fact tone.

Naruto gave all three a blank stair, "console, VD, online, what the hell are you guys talking about? Are you even speaking the same language as before?"

All three looked at the younger blond on the couch in surprise, "wait, don't you know what those things are?" Motoyasu asked, "I thought a kid like you would have at least heard of a console, at the very least. What, are your parents not able to get you one?"

"I don't think it's not that they can't get one, it might be because he's not allowed to have one. Or they just can't afford it," Itsuki said as if he was pitting Naruto for not having the experience.

"What are you talking about?" Ren asked confused, "everyone has VR back home, even my mom uses VR for yoga. Even my dad uses it for conferences calls for work sometimes when he can't make it to the office in time for meetings. How can he not have one when the latest model just came out last week?"

Motoyasu hopped off the bed he was sitting on and stood in front of everyone, a serious look on his face, "wait just a minute now Ren. This VR thing you're talking about, does everyone understand it? Itsuki, you know what he's talking about?"

Itsuki nodded his head, "well, yes, a recent sy-fy lecture went into the concept of it a little while ago, so I can understand it somewhat."

"I see," Motoyasu turned to Naruto, "and what about you?" Naruto gave him a blank face. VR, what the heck even was that? Was what Naruto wanted to say, but decided to play it cool and shook his head, this seemed to get some raised brows. "Okay, what about consoles, do you know about them?"

"Nope," Naruto answered.

"And computers? Do you not use or have them?" Itsuki chimed in.

"Yeah, I've used a computer once when I was about four, but that's about it. From what you guys are saying, it seems like I'm the only one of us who doesn't know anything about this world, but at the same time, it seems like we're all from totally different versions of the world we know." Naruto explained, "from my point of view, you guys are from the future, or at least a world with a lot more tech than mines."

"If that's so, then what is your version of Japan like, um...what was your name again?" Itsuki asked.

"Oh, right, I don't think we heard his name back then," Ren stated after thinking back. "Why didn't you introduce yourself like the rest of us?"

_"Because the king was rude and would listen," _thought the twelve-year-old. "Haa, it's not like my name really matter in the end anyway." He stated as he sat back in a relaxed pose, "it's not like we're going to be staying here forever right? Why get comfortable here when we may never see each other after a few months?"

The other three looked at each other, "you may have a point," Itsuki started. "Still, we should all try to get along while we're here right?"

"Right," Motoyasu nodded. "By the way, I wonder what else is different in each of our worlds. Let's compare our knowledge."

Naruto listened to the trio talk about things that he's never heard of, saying terms like 'popstar' and 'cellphone models'. He didn't understand it and just waited for them all to finish so that they could leave. In the end, they confirmed what he had already told them, the versions of their worlds were very different from who's face was on the money to what country won what war. It would have been more interesting if they shared some similarities to his world in some way other than people were human and walked around on two legs, but that's about were things ended of him. As he thought, he was transported into a completely different world than his own, but why was he getting the vibe that things weren't so different from back in his world? He wasn't sure, other than what happened with the king earlier, he had no reason to believe that things were the same as in Konoha, yet, there was still a lot left for him to see. Once Ren, Motoyasu, and Itsuki had satisfied their curiosity about each other's world, they tried to get Naruto to tell them about his world, but the blond didn't budge one centimeter under their questions. In the end, they gave up and called it a night, Naruto was getting pretty tired himself, this was the most human interactions he's had in a long time, and the only one that didn't involve him getting hurt in some way. He dared to say that it was almost a fun encounter, but he wouldn't go so far just yet. He just met them and he got a bad feeling in his gut, it wasn't really from any of the would-be heroes, but from something else, even earlier he wasn't liking his surroundings. Something was going to happen soon, he could feel.

He only hoped that his gut was wrong and he could live in peace, even if it is for a short time.

.

.

.

.

**To be continued **


	5. Betray

Naruto wasn't fooling.

He might look young in the eyes of these people, but in his world, kids his age would already be ninjas by now. Trained killers. Not to mention that he received his training from the most powerful of all nine tailed beasts starting at the age of five. He really wasn't one you should underestimate. He was able to sufficiently support himself, alone in the forest for years thanks to the Kyuubi's training. He's lived in a village that was out for his blood since the moment he was born. He would not allow himself to be tricked or fooled, or anything of that nature so easily.

So why?

Why did they think he was so easy to manipulate right now? As he stood in the throne room looking at all those who accused him, he saw his mistake. He saw the person responsible for making him look like he was nothing more than a dumb child running while without parental supervision. Some that needed to be watched like a defenseless baby. It was enough to make him want to set ablaze the castle and the very ground that these people walked on. But he calmed down enough to remember clearly what got him into this mess. 

Or rather, who...

* * *

**The day before**

It was early the following morning when Naruto woke up. He had a bit of a hard time falling asleep last night, that gut feeling keeping him away for most of the night. When he got up, he went to the bathroom to get started with his morning routine. He washed his face, fixed his hair a little, and then left to see if he could find something to do until breakfast was ready. He always woke up early, most of the time he would be up before the sunrise, but since he couldn't really sleep, he got up slightly later than his usual norm. When he left his room, he decided to walk around a bit because he was bord, he didn't really have any destination in mind, so he just continued to walk about until it got brighter outside, then he would find the others to have breakfast. He sort of hope that the breakfast they would be serving was going to be better than last night's dinner, if he didn't know any better, he would have said that someone was trying to poison him or something. His meal tasted...off, he didn't detect any poisonous substance being used in the food, even if they had tried, he had already built up a fairly strong resistance to just about everything poisonous in his world. Still, because of last night's dinner, his gut feeling had only grown, just little more, but enough to make him wary this morning. As he walked, he came upon a portate of the king and some person he suspected to be his wife or daughter. She had an odd shade of color to her hair, it was similar to wine but with a slightly brighter effect. He could see how some people would call her beautiful, but Naruto didn't care much for looks, he would rather judge others on personalities than looks alone. Having nothing to entertain himself further, Naruto decided to find the other so-called heroes to join them for breakfast. When he made his way to the dining hall, it was much later in the morning and the heroes were already sitting down eating with the maids happily serving them. Naruto entered the room silently and sat down without saying a word, he wanted to see how long it would take them to notice his presence there, he didn't his chakra signature or anything when he entered. Not that he thought they would be able to sense it anyway. Yet no one paid him any mind, that is until a made walking past the sword hero to refill Motoyasu's cup did she finally look up and notice that there was an extra person sitting at the table.

"Oh my! Sir Shield Hero, when did you get here?" The made exclaimed as she really did seem to have gotten startled by Naruto's somewhat sudden appearance in the room. _"How could they have missed him? When did he enter? He wasn't with the other three heroes, was he?"_ Where all the thoughts running through her thick head.

The maid's sudden outburst drew more attention to Naruto. He would have been ashamed of being caught so easily until he remembered that he was waiting for them to notice him first. _"That sure took a hell of a lot longer than I thought, are these guys really maids or what? If the maids are like this, then sneaking into the palace must be a breeze if everyone this laid back. I almost want to test that theory, but now's not the time." _ Naruto sighed, "I've been here for a while, but I guess I'm more of the Ghost Hero than the Shield Hero," he got up and started walking towards the exit seeing how someone had already arrived to take them to the throne room. The other's in the room seemed to have lost their previously good mood when he walked out without another word, the maid didn't even apologies, instead, she just stood there with a confused look on her face. A few moments later after leaving the hall, Naruto felt a hand on his shoulder, he glanced at the offending hand as if it had committed a great sin. The intensity of his stair must have been hot enough to start a fire because the person the hand was connected to removed it so quickly it was almost like it never happened.

"U-uhm, sorry," Motoyasu stated a little nervously. _"Is he had that someone didn't come to wake him up for breakfast in time?" _The older blond wondered as he scratched the side of his head, "didn't anyone wake you up for breakfast?"

"Nope, I woke up on my own earlier and went for a walk. Then I went to check if breakfast was ready and found you guys already in there," Naruto stated after dusting off the shoulder the older blond touched. "When I arrived, I decided to just have a seat and wait until someone gave me my breakfast, but it didn't seem like sitting there as a guest of honor, but more like a simple observer since no one noticed me." He looked to Ren and Itsuki who had arrived with Motoyasu, "not even Ren, the very person I was sitting next to."

Ren was a little surprised when he noticed the younger blond sitting next to him after the maid's outburst. _"How didn't I notice him before? Was it because I was too busy thinking of ways to raise my states?" _

Naruto shrugged his shoulders, "nevermind, it's too late now, the king's probably waiting on us now." Naruto walked away from the trio and made his way over to the door to the throne room. The other three joined him a second later and the doors were opened. By now Naruto was starting to feel...tired? Frustrated? Angry, maybe? He didn't know, it was something that was making him agitated but he couldn't put his finger on the emotion he was currently feeling right now. It was as if he had a premonition of something happening, but it wasn't very clear just yet. Ever since Naruto was very young, he had been able to sense danger days before it happened in dreams he's had before. However, he had never had any dreams of coming to another world before, he did have a dream of leaving the village for good when he was still six. That day he woke up with a great big smile on his face and wanted to advance in his training more than ever thinking that he was going to have to survive outside soon. Yet, years went by until he was standing here. Before a king that looked at him as if he had done something wrong. When the four of them entered the hall, Naruto picked up the scent of someone familiar in the room, he took in a deep breath as he was taking in all the scents of the room. He was a little disappointed to note that the scent he smelled wasn't Kurama, he did know this scent though. The smell of fresh grass in the summer mix with herbs, it was a nice scent and he guessed the owner of it wasn't someone that he dispised like the rest of the village he came from. Although he never interacted with that person before, not like his classmates, and certainly not like the villagers._"My main question is, why is he here in another world? Is it really him, or..." _ he let his eyes scan the crowd in the room, picking up a familiar ponytail in the crowd. _"Is he another version of that person from my world?"_

Naruto was drawn out from his thoughts when the kind Aul-something, what was his name again? Anyway, when the king started speaking, "Legendary Heroes, we have gathered all the great adventures to aid you in your mission." Naruto looked at the collective line of people standing at the foot of the stairs leading to the king's throne. He scanned them to which ones looked the strongest to him, there was a woman with wine tinted hair that noticed his stair and smiled at him. Naruto gave no reaction and continued to scan the group, he didn't see anyone that stood out to him, but he couldn't really judge their skills by only looking at them, he needed to see them in action first to be sure. "These's adventures will now choose the party that they would like to join with," announced the king as the people in question started walking towards the four heroes. 

Ren got five.

Motoyasu got three.

Itsuki got four.

And Naruto got none. Naruto looked at the other's party members noticing how reluctant they looked to join him, he sighed, _"well, this just won't do. How do they expect me to fight against a Wave by myself? I mean, if I knew that I could use magic in place of chakra, then it'd all good, but I at least need a guide to tell me what's up with this states crap and how to use it!" _He stepped forward, arms folded in front of his chest as he looked up at the king, "so, are the rest of the adventures in the back or what? Or do you really expect me to do all of this on my own?"

"My, this really is a wonder," the king stated, although Naruto thought his acting skills could use a little work. "Is there really no one who would join the Shield Hero on his journey?" No one budged from their chosen party, Naruto wasn't expecting them too with the way they were looking at him. Did a past Sheild Hero do something bad to this land while trying to save and that's why there's so much strive against him? "Hm, this really is unprecedented, what should we do?"

_"There he goes with the acting again, a first-year in the academy would do better than him right now," _Naruto thought with a blank face. The guy standing at the king's side whispered something in his ear. The king then made a face Naruto thought suited his underline tone more correctly, _"his true colors are revealed then. He really must not have liked the past Shield Hero, in any case, that's none of my concern."_

"It has come to my attention that the Sheild Hero is ignorant of our world. In the past, all the heroes were meant to have some knowledge of our ways, but now..." the king sighed seemingly at a loss. "The rumor has spread around the civilians which is why this seems to be happening now."

"Hmph, I see, that's how it is then, huh?" Naruto shrugged his shoulder, "I suppose I will have to go it alone then, make sure you set up the funeral for when I die. Since the civilians want to see a twelve-year-old die in the face of battle do easily." His main goal was to strike grief in the hearts of the women in the area, and maybe some fathers too. He didn't think it would work, but at least he would play them a little while they are showing him no kindness either.

Just then, a girl from the back of Motorasu's all-girl team raised their hand. It was the girl with wine-colored hair, Naruto turned back to see her, eyebrow raised, he wondered what her angle was. Did his words get to her? She didn't really look old enough to be a mother, but still, this was another world and he and no idea of their customers. Besides, in his world, as soon as you become a ninja at twelve, you are officially an adult by law so there wasn't much difference in that regard. "Sir Hero, would it be alright for me to switch parties to join the Shield hero?" She asked sincerely walking over to Motoyasu.

"Are you sure?" Motoyasu asked seeming doubtful of letting her go.

The girl smiled at him, "sure," then turned to Naruto. Since Naruto was much smaller, and younger than her, naturally she had to look down at him.

"Sure, nice to meet you," Naruto said with a blank face. He wouldn't let his emotions show but he was suspicious of this girl. Her face looked familiar to him, she looked very similar to the girl in the portrait he saw earlier so he was suspicious. In his eyes, hair color like that stands out, but it could be common here, although he hadn't seen any of the maids and other servants with looks like hers, he also hadn't stepped foot outside of the castle since their arrival. He turned back to the king and noticed his face changed a bit to a more serious-looking one than before, Naruto mentally smirked, _"he's letting down his guard a bit in front of me, that must mean two things. This girl wasn't supposed to join his team, or she's someone that the king holds dear and doesn't want to part with. Wonder which one it might be," _his mind flashed back to the portrait once more and he glanced back at the new and only other member of his party, _"if this is the king's daughter, I'll have to be careful. I don't know if she's inherited her father's hatred for the shield or not yet. I'll keep her at arm's length for now."_

"Is there anyone else that will join this party?" The king asked, no one answered or moved, "very well then, Shield Hero, you will have to recruit for your party on your own. Every month the hero's will get an allowance, however, this one time, the Shield Hero will get a slightly higher allowance than the other heroes. Here is your personal chest."

Some people walked out of the crowd holding sacks of money for the heroes. "Shield Hero gets eight-hundred coins while the others get six," one of them announced, after that, all the heroes left the throne room after the king dismissed them.

.

.

.

On the way out of the castle, Naruto and his lone party member climbed the steps to get to the gate when he heard the other heroes wishing him luck. He waved to them not really caring since he wouldn't see them for a long time he would only be this nice. "Um, Sir Shield Hero, my name is Mien Suvia, a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

Naruto nodded, "nice meeting you too, now let's go get started on training," he stated as he turned to continue up the stairs.

This seemed to surprise Mien, "wait, aren't you going to tell me your name?"

Naruto thought about it for a second. "I would," he turned to her with a small smirk, "but in my world, one's true name is only spoken among their closest friends, lovers, and family. I hope you can understand this, so for now, you can call me..." he thought for a second, "Menma. Menma Uchiha, now let's."

"Uh, okay, Menma..." Mien said wondering about the oddness of this kid's name. However, he did come from another world so she let it slight, but she didn't like his attitude one bit. That being said, she would still keep up her act around him.

As the day passed them by, Main told Naruto everything that he needed to know about training and leveling up. The thing about the monster parts being used to help strengthen his shield seemed to be helpful. As he trained, he found the little orange monsters that tried to attack him to be nothing more than small insects that tried to bite him any chance they get, quite annoying. Thanks to Kurama's training, he was able to take out all the monsters that came his way, every attack he landed on them made them go 'pop' like a balloon. Everyone that he popped would be fed into the shield to help him level up, "oh, Menma, maybe you should save some of them for later. We can sell them off to the merchants to earn money on the road," Mien explained.

"Money huh? How much are these things even worth anyway?" Naruto wondered as he looked at a piece of orange monster remains. 

"I'm not sure, but we can find out when we sell them off." Mien stated, "each monster has a different value, the higher the monster, the more money you'll get. However, compared to other monsters, these orange ones are kind of useless."

"...Hm, maybe, but I think everything should at least have a use and purpose and not just be completely useless." Naruto explained as put let his shield suck up the last of the monster, they heard an explosion nearby and turned around to see Ren's party. It looked like they were probably already on a level higher than Naruto right now or their teamwork was just that good. Whichever it was, they were taking down monsters left and right quicker than Naruto was on his own with just a shield. Even though the orange monster balls traying to attack Naruto seemed to be the same strength as a three-year-old child to him, there was still a lot of them to deal with. And they only came coming. Mien was doing nothing to help him, only sitting back and watching, Naruto could see Ren's teammates at least watching his back, while Mien only sat in the shade and offered up some facts about the random things that Naruto asked about this world. She was as he thought, useless, he wanted to the curb right now because he was so mad, but he couldn't just kick her out on her first day just because of this small issue. If it kept happening, however, that's when he would dump her ass off at the castle without a second thought. He had no need for people that would only hold him back in the end. Upon Naruto's request, they started training first since back in his world, Naruto didn't use any armor to train, he still had on the weights that he was wearing before he got transported into this world. They might have been heavy two months ago when he first put them on, but now they were starting to feel like a part of his regular everyday wear, plus they were durable. They could work as armor for now so he wanted to get to the training field first to get a feel for fighting low-level monsters. So far things were going well, boringly so, he wanted a challenge while he trained, maybe getting some armor might add some weight on, he also wanted to train his speed to get it as close to nii-san as possible...

Naruto stopped fighting the orange balls for a second as he thought back to the only human that actually tried to make friends with him when he was little. Rock Lee was an odd one, kind of loud too, but he trained harder than anyone else in the academy. He'd spotted the odd kid many times doing a bunch of extra sit-ups, pull-ups, squats, and kicks long after his classmates had left for the day. Naruto couldn't sense much chakra in Lee's body, it was low enough for others to say that he didn't have any, but Naruto could sense a small amount. Though small, Lee did have chakra within him, Naruto was sure of that after Lee tried many times to befriend him, they started to train together in secret away from the villager's prying eyes and they constantly tried to outdo each other. _"I wonder how he's doing now, he's sure would have suspected my disappearance from the village to be odd by now right? I mean, it's already been at least three or so weeks since I left, he had to have noticed, right?" _Naruto's shoulder's slumped as he thought back on the only person who would truly miss him back home. _"No doubt that he would be trying to convince the others that I was innocent of all the false crimes that they accuse me of left and right. Speaking of crimes, I wonder where Kurama ran off to, did we really get transported together?" _

"Menma, what are you thinking about?" Mien was leaning forward with her face close to the young blond's. Her goal heir was for him, even though young, to get a good look down her shirt. She knew that she was well-blessed up top and wanted to give Naruto a little peek in order to kick off her plans. _"After all, what man would deny such a view."_

Naruto came back to his senses and noticed Mien with her chest practically on display. Without shame, he stared at it with a blank face before walking away, "come on, let's go back, I want to check out that weapons shop you mentioned earlier."

_"Did he just..." _Mien felt like Naruto had just given her a less than passing grade in the class and she did not like that face. _"Oh, he is so going to pay for that later!" _He was already walking away by the time she seemed to get over herself and joined him. Once back in town, Mien too Naruto to a weapons shop, "here it is, the best weapons shop in town."

Naruto looked around thoughtfully at the items in the shop. As he looked around, the shop owner came out to greet him, he was a big dude with muscles, a bold head, and a beard. He looked tough but Naruto knew that wasn't enough to win in a fight, still, this guy's smile was easy going. "Hello, and welcome to my shop, is this your first time in a weapons shop?"

"Yes, this is my first time being able to buy a weapon too," Naruto started walking over to the counter. He jabbed his thumb behind him at Mien, "she told me that this was the best, so we're here to get supplies to start adventuring." 

"You don't say, hey, aren't you..." the man started and Mien, subtly shook her head when she thought Naruto wasn't looking. The shop keeper was curious but turned his attention back to Naruto as he got closer, "hey, you're a little young to be an adventure, aren't ya kid?" The shop keeper stated looking down at Naruto, he thought the blond seemed short, but now that he got a good look at him, he was definitely on the young side

Naruto shrugged, "in my world, kids my age would have already been considered adults already through an exam. You could say that it's a right of passage after all the training we did until now."

"Ohoho, so your an adult in your world, eh? How old are you? You seem a little short to be an adult," the man laughed. "How old are you to be such a short adult?"

"I'm twelve," Naruto replied nonchalantly as he leaned on the counter. The man had a shocked look on his face, Naruto smirked, "I'm curious, how old are the adventures when they're allowed to start?"

"Hm, I would say about fifteen or fourteen at the youngest, I think. Some like to start around that time, but legally, they're allowed to start at sixteen or seventeen," the shop keeper explained.

Naruto nodded interested, as they were talking, Naruto noticed that someone else had entered the store behind them. He could smell the scent of grass and herbs lingering towards the back. He had been picking up that smell ever since they left the castle that morning, during the time they were training, and even as they walked through the streets. Now Naruto was getting curious, who even was this person to follow him like this? Was he a guard for the princess or what? If so, he wasn't doing such a good job if Naruto was able to pick up on him. If he was to be a guard here, he wouldn't let anyone pick up his presence or scent. "Anyway, sir, we may get on with the reason why we came here please," Mien chimed in.

"Oh, sorry miss...uh, by the way, you really do look familiar, have we met before?" The man asked focusing on Mien, Naruto glanced back at the princess wondering if she would reveal herself to this guy. The answer was obvious to him, he guessed that royalty didn't want to get found out while not doing royal things, especially when they were dressed in an outfit that looked like they were going out to have fun. Her purple dress was short and purple, showing off her legs, most of her back was exposed, and he was sure that she couldn't fight very well in such an outfit without worrying that it'll get ripped to pieces.

_"Was she even thinking when she got dressed today? She may be a princess, but she's no commoner, did her father not want her to go that badly that he'd send his own daughter out unequipped?" _Naruto wondered, but he doubted it, he was guessing that she was going to use him to get what she needed. He was going to continue to keep a close eye on her to make sure that she didn't slow him down, or got him in trouble.

"Yes, I've been in here before," Mien stated, even though the shop keeper didn't seem to recall her face for a moment. "Anyhow, can you please provide Sir Menma with some weapons that fit his needs."

"'Sir'? Is he a noble or something?" Asked the owner.

Naruto held up his right arm to show off the shield that was apparently welded onto his being, "I'm the Shield Hero."

"Ah! So you're the dud huh? Alright, I'll see what I can do for you," the owner walked away to gather some swords and brought them back to be inspected. "Take your pick," he said after telling them about the swords.

Naruto looked over the swords on display and went to pick up one intending to swing it around. He had never held a sword before, but he supposed that this was a good time to try out when he went back to training. However, as soon as he picked it up, lightning erupted from his hand and he dropped it. "What the-" he reached for another sword, thinking that he picked the wrong one, but the same thing happened again and the sword flew out of his hand. When that happened a warning appeared before his eyes telling him that the legendary heroes could not use any other weapons other than the ones assigned, "well that sucks. I can't use anything other than this shield, how will I fight?" He wondered out loud.

"How does that work?" The shop owner walker to Naruto, getting down on one knee, he used a magnifying glass to look at the shield on the boy's arm. "well, from a glance it looks like any other small shield, but there's a bit of magic coming from this core. Huh," he stood up and put his hands on his hips as he looked down at the shield, "well, thanks for showing me something interesting at least. Would you like to buy some armor?"

Naruto shrugged his shoulders, "might as well, it's the whole reason I came." He started turning to the owner, "do you happen to have some armor that is slightly weighted but isn't bulky?"

"Weighted but not too bulky...held on, let me see what I have." The man walked away with a thoughtful look on his face, a few minutes later, he returned. "It's not all that heavy, but it will protect you in a pinch, it's kind of unheard of for someone to ask for armor that's both weighted but not bulky. If you want more weight than this, then I might have to make something custom, what's your budget like?"

"Two hundred and fifty silver," Mien replied.

The owner nodded anded the item to Naruto to look at. The blond looked at the armor he was given, it was a little stiff but still easily moveable, the material seemed to be similar as chainmail. But the added weight off it wasn't what he was expecting, it was light, lighter than the weights he was wearing under his jacket now, not to mention big. "Hmm, I guess this will have to do, but I suppose you wouldn't have anything smaller, would you?"

"Haha, sorry 'bout that little man, but you're the smallest customer that I've ever sold to. However, I can make something in your size later once I have your measurements down, for now, just try it on and tell how you like the material," the owner stated like a true businessman. Naruto shrugged his shoulders and went into the dressing room when, he came out he was wearing the oversized brown and tan armor like a dress. The owner laughed, "yep, as I thought, it's much too big, and that's the smallest size I have," he took out a measuring tape and started taking Naruto's measurements. As they were doing that, Mien started looking around the shop and picking up items for herself, "where, all done, you can come back in tomorrow and pick it up then."

"Thanks, how much will that cost?" Naruto asked.

"One hundred fifty," the owner replied.

"And how much would it cost if I sell it back?" Naruto asked.

The owner raised a brow and smirked, "you wanna sell it off that quick and I haven't even made it yet?"

"It's not that, I'm definitely going to get stronger, so when I do, I will probably need stronger armor, that's all," Naruto explained.

The owner nodded accepting the answer, "fine, fair point, if it's still in fairly new condition, I'll give you a hundred for it. Sound good enough to you?"

Naruto nodded with a bright smile, "it's a deal." It sounded like a fair enough deal for him since it would have to be made to fit him, and he would be getting it the next day.

The two shook hands, "by the way, it looks like your lady friend wants something as well."

Naruto looked over at the counter to see Mien standing there with a pile of armor. Naruto sweatdropped, "and that's cost..."

"About four hundred twenty silver," The owner started getting back to his feet.

"Seriously?! Man, that leaves us with just over two hundred," Naruto frowned from the mental math. "Hey, Mien, you think you can downgrade a little? I don't know how much lodging and food is gonna cost yet," he stated as he took off the oversized armor.

"Oh, but Sir Hero, the stronger I am, the more loot we'll get from the dungeons, right?" He stated as she walked closer to the young boy and held his held him close lovingly like a sister or a mother.

Naruto wasn't moved by her actions, "wouldn't we still get loot even with a downgraded version?"

"Well, yes, but it wouldn't be enough, plus higher grade armor will protect me better! That way I can help you fight longer!" Mien said cheerfully as she hugged him, unaware of Naruto's growing discomfort. "I just couldn't live with myself if I allowed something to happen to you while I got injured in low-grade armor," she pulled Naruto in closer until he was headfirst into her boobs.

Naruto's discomfort turned into anger, he pushed her away from him. He hated it when people touched him for any length of time. Especially girls due to multiple incidents that happened to him when he was younger that left him with mental scars. "Fine, do whatever you want, just stop touching me so much, it's uncomfortable!" Naruto marched over to the counter, put the money on the counter, and walked over to the door, "call me when you're done," then he walked out to wait.

The two left inside staired at him as he left, Mien looked over to the shop owner, "was it something I said?"

The man shrugged his shoulder, well, you were being kinda pushy. Not to mention how uncomfortable he looked when he was being held by you, I know most men would jump at the chance to receive that kind of treatment from a pretty girl. But I don't think our boy Menma has grown to that point just yet," he turned to Mien, "maybe you shouldn't push him too much. I know you might think he's cute when he's trying to seem mature, but remember, he's still a kid," he explained. He did think that Mien's actions were a bit over the top against a boy like Naruto.

"Er, yes, thank you, I'll keep that in mind," Mien said politely as she was still a little startled by being pushed away so suddenly. It wasn't a very strong push, but why did she get the feeling that he was holding back when he pushed her? He didn't know so she decided to let it slide.

Meanwhile, outside the shop, Naruto was leaning against the wall waiting for the girl to finish. As he was waiting, he was approached by a cloaked figure. The scent of summer grass and herbs filled his nose and he looked up to see the familiar face of Shikamaru Nara. From his pale skin to his soft, baby-like face, to the way his ponytail was done, but this wasn't the Shikamaru he knew from home. "What do you want?" Naruto stated blandly, he was probably being rude, but he was still mad about Mien's impertinent.

"I would like to join your party," stated the Shikamaru look-alike.

"You? Why? Are you even an adventure, I thought they started around like sixteen or seventeen. You don't look much older than me," Naruto said as he pushed off the wall to look at the boy fully. His body was covered by the clack clock around him, but he could still tell that he had a small build even for a boy.

"No, I'm not an adventure, but I can still help you out. You need party members, right?" The boy stated.

"I might need members to join my party, however, I don't need anyone who can't pull their weight." Naruto replied, "what can you offer me that will help my journey?"

"Well, I've been here for a while, and I've done some traveling before, so I can probably help you with that. I've been to a couple of places outside this town and can be a guide." The clocked boy explained, "I can also use magic, if you like, I can probably teach you if you like."

"Magic?" Naruto thought it over, "sounds tempting..." he rubbed his chin as he thought, "then-"

"Sir Hero! I'm ready!" Mien said as she spotted him once she came out of the shop. She was wearing her new armor and walked right up to Naruto, "how do I look?" She asked as she twirled around.

Naruto gave her a blank look, "okay I guess."

Mien smiled, even though she was expecting a better answer than that, "thank you." Then she noticed the other boy, "who's this?"

"I'm-" the clocked boy started but Naruto cut him off.

"He was just leaving," Naruto stated. The Shikamaru look-alike looked surprised at Naruto, Naruto didn't let anything show on his face.

"Oh, well if that's the case, then we should go to eat! Come on, I'll show you to a great in that serves food too," Mien started running in the direction of the in down the road.

Naruto waited until Mien was out of earshot to turn back to the look-alike. It was surprising how closely this guy looked to the Shikamaru he went to school with. He didn't have much chance to talk with that Shikamaru, but he observed him a few times while in class, under that lazy appearance was a calculating genius. Naruto could tell these things because he had two eyes and a brain, unlike the villagers and sensei's in the academy, apparently. The look-alike already had a calculating look on his face, Naruto shrugged, "I'd like to let you join now, but I'm not in a good mood, catch me sometime tomorrow and talk to me then. I'll think about your offer, and in turn, you can tell me about this magic business, I'm curious about it myself since I got here. Night," he turned away from the other boy and walked towards the inn Mien ran off to.

"Wait!" Shikamaru turned to Naruto, the blond looked back at him, "do you know who that girl is? You should be careful not to get too close to her." Naruto thought over those words, they were a little surprising to hear. However, he already had a feeling that he knew this fact from the start. Either way, he nodded and continued to walk off while Shikamaru watched him go, a sad look on his face, _"Naruto...stay safe." _ He was going to follow them but a hand grabbed his clock, looking behind him, he saw that it was his boss. A small woman that deals in magic and crystal balls, she was the one that told him about magic in the first place after he entered this world, "hey boss."

"Shikamaru, dear, where do you think you're going? You still have to take your magic exam, you promised to show me how good you've gotten after only being here a month. Now come along, I don't want you getting cold feet now," the little witch stated cheerfully as she pulled Shikamaru alone with her.

"Haa, yes ma'am," Shikamaru replied as he allowed himself to be dragged effortlessly by the old woman no bigger than hie was.

.

.

.

At the inn, Naruto and Mien ordered food and wine for dinner. As they ate and talked, Naruto picked up on how much more flirty Mien was being with him, she even went as far as so suggest something being done in her room. Naruto was getting sick of her unwanted advances and decided to shut it down, "oh, what's wrong, Sir, Menma, you like to retire early tonight?"

Naruto let out a breath as he put down his knife and fork, "listen, Mien. I don't know what you're thinking about, but from what I can tell, you're at least four years older than me. If you were anyone else, I might have been tempted to let you down kindly, but you haven't picked up any of my hints. So I'll give it to you straight...I'm not."

Mien looked at him in confusion will still trying to work her charm, "hm? You're not what?"

"Straight," Naruto replied, taking another bite of his food. He was really hungry and they had been training most of the day anyway, so he was starving now since he didn't get breakfast. Not to mention they worked through lunch, much to Mien's disapproval.

"Um, Menma, sir, I'm not sure what you're-"

"I'm gay," Naruto took another bite before washing it down with the water he ordered in place of the glass of wine he wasn't even touching.

Mien sat there looking at Naruto in shock, "what? No, wait, you're joking right?" 

"Nope," he replied quickly, he was sure that she was probably in disbelieve right about now. It's not every day that twelve-year-olds come out of the closet as calmly as this.

Mien sat there watching Naruto finish his dinner as she watched her plan fall apart in front of her. She couldn't tell if this was a dream or a bad joke, "you-re...you're serious?"

"Yep," Naruto finished his water. He stood up, "that was good, I'm going to bed, night," then he walked away from the table. Leaving Mien to stew in her frustration. When Naruto returned to his room, he locked the door and checked all the windows to make sure that it couldn't be opened from the outside, out of habit. Next, he checked the rest of the room to make sure it wasn't bugged with anything. Not that he would know how people would bug a room when it didn't look like they used the same methods as his world. After that, he took out the money that he was carrying and emptied half of it on the bed. He then took out his emergency sewing kit and ripped a small piece off from the corner of the sheets and got to work making a secret pocket on the inside of his jacket. He took the money he emptied out on the bed and stored it in the new pocket inside his jacket, "there, this will be for an emergency, the rest will be for everyday use, now I'll get some sleep."

* * *

**Present**

When morning came, royal nights were at his room door ready to take him to the palace. No questions asked. When he got there, they were already accusing him of something that he didn't do. It turns out that Mien Souvet or Soulent or whatever her name was, was actually Princess Melty Malramark. The king's oldest daughter. And a lier. She had everyone eating out of her hands saying that, even though Naruto, a twelve-year-old boy, who was still just a kid, had raped her that night. She told them that in his world, this was a right of passage, apparently twisting his words from the day before in the shop. The other three heroes were there, and the spear hero, Motoyasu, the party she was originally from, was holding her tightly to comfort her. Naruto couldn't believe his eyes, but at the same time, he could. He was sick to his stomach. He had somehow let her get to close, close enough to deal this hard enough of a blow, but rape was a serious crime in his eyes. He knew a victim of rape all too well, mainly because he was one himself, many times before being kicked out on the streets. But Melty? She wasn't a victim, she was a lier that tried to trick him into getting too close and still managed to tear him down from square one. "You bitch! I hope you get raped for real! I already told you I was ga-" Naruto started to yell but Melty cranked up the waterworks some more and blocked him out.

"You scum!" Motoyasu shouted, "I thought that you were just a kid, but I guess even a fox can appear in wolds clothing."

This comment didn't sit well with Naruto, "what was that, pretty boy? You wanna say something to my face, come over and say it then, you tiny dick hooker!" He cursed as the guards tried to hold him back, honestly, he had to hold himself back from unleashing his full power to anyone. In reality, the day that they arrived in this godforsaken place, while everyone thought that he was at level one like the other heroes, he was actually already on level three. He didn't know how or why he was ahead of them, maybe it was because of Kurama, maybe it was his training, or something else, whichever it was, he knew he wasn't a weakling. These people were treating him like trash, just like when he was in the village, he was sick of it. 

"You! I knew I should have done something about you the moment I saw you!" King what's his face shouted as he pointed accusingly at Naruto. "From this point on, the Shield Hero will no longer gain aid from this kingdom! I am stripping you of everything you have, and word of this will spread throughout the land! From now on, the Shield Hero will not be allowed into this castle unless its to report in after the Wave or to check to the Dragon Hour Glass! Now be gone!"

Naruto gritted his teeth, his vision started to go gray. "Fine, but mind my words, if you're going to condemn an innocent guy like me, then I hope that justest finds a guilty one like all of you! And if justice isn't found, then I curse you all to burn in hell!" Naruto turned his back and marched out of the throne room, the knights followed him out until he reached the gate of the palace. Once Naruto was standing in front of it, with the nights watching around him, he spits at the entrance before leaving the grounds. His anger already boiling hottest than lava at his treatment.

Nothing had changed.

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.

.

.

.

Or has it?

**To be continued **


	6. The act of anger

Naruto was mad. 

No, not just mad, he was pissed.

To think that he had the smallest amount of hope for this place. For these people. And they destroyed him. He didn't get why they hated him so much or was it because his so-called weapon was useless? He hated it, he hated everything to do with this place, but he couldn't exactly leave to go back to his own world. That would just put him back where he first started. He couldn't go home because he was being hunted, and he couldn't stay here because people that he was a weak, useless, piece of scum that they could kick around. He felt like dirt back home, and even now. Everything around him was losing it's original color, turning black and white without the gray. He didn't care for it, but it wouldn't look any different if things were in color again anyway, so he had to live with this now. "Ha, look at this, something else that these humans have taken away from me. Why should I even bother doing as they say then?" Naruto sighed as he watched the wold fade to black and white with every step he took. He couldn't see the point of staying, but there was no way for him to go home, "life really does suck huh?" He chuckled to himself as he realized that his wondering around and landed him right back to the training field, the same field that bitch had taken him to just to think up this whole scheme.

And he fell for it in the end. What a fool he's been.

Naruto chuckled again. His chuckling turned into laugher, his laughter turning into hysterics as he couldn't seem to control himself anymore. He spotted those orange ball monster approaching him again, just like before, but he didn't do anything. He faintly wondered if these monsters were poisonous in any way, maybe they could put him out of his misery. One latched on to his right leg, another on his right arm, two more got his leg and one more clamped onto his head. Yet he didn't feel a thing, his mood seemed to darken at this realization, "right, of course, that would be too easy, wouldn't it?" He looked at the orange things as if they were nothing, one quick swing of his arm and the first orange ball popped on impact. Naruto looked down at his hand, "that was much easier than I thought," he pulled up his statues, "but I'm only on level three? How boring," he remembered one of those basters, Ren, maybe? Either way, he remembered one of them talking about how a game he once played allowed him to collect tons of stuff after slaying a dragon. Naruto was faintly interested in seeing a dragon during that time of hearing about it, however, as it stood now, he needs money. A place to stay. And food. These were his three major complaints about this world, he could care less about fighting in a wave or helping others out, he just wanted to take care of himself from now on. Nothing else mattered to him at this moment.

Well, he said that, but really, there was one thing. 

Kurama.

He needed to find him. If they were together in the library during the time he was summoned to this stupid place, they should have arrived together. Yet it has been about three days since his arrival and he's been humiliated and wrongfully accused. Abandoned and insulted. What's more, they still expect him to fight for them, was this a joke? He was ordered to, but he didn't feel like fighting for them. Yet, fighting against them wasn't to his taste either, honestly, he was a little stuck on what to do. He took in a deep breath and sighed, he felt the movement of the other ball monsters on him and it irritated him. "Arrg, get off me!" He ripped off the one on his arm, threw it on the floor, and stepped on it with all his might to make it pop, as he did so, he imagined that bitch was the one he was stepping on. The one he was crushing underneath his feet for making him look like such a fool. He hated a lot of things, but he's never wished for someone's death so strongly before in all of his life. The villagers might have done things to spit him, but they knew him his whole life. She knew him all of one day and caused more damage to his outlook than ever before. He literally couldn't see color anymore because of it. Angered once more by the recent events, Naruto charged into the forest area to find more monsters to beat up after getting rid of the remaining ones on his body. Naruto was so angry he couldn't think straight, so he decided to do something about it. He targetted all the orange ball monsters that he found and crushed them all, there only seemed to be orange balls with angry faces for a long while. Due to his rage, he lost track of time as he continued to attack, morning turned into evening, and the evening turned into dusk. In that time, Naruto went through all the monsters that came his way, before he realized it, he was taking on different types of monsters with his bare hands. Mushroom monsters and other rabid low-level creatures that lived in the forest surrounding the castle. Time flew by into the next day and Naruto found himself past out among the corpses of the creatures he managed to take down in his blind rage yesterday. There were many kinds that Naruto hadn't seen before now, he didn't even remember fighting them at all. However, this might have been a good thing since it looked like he was finally back to his senses not. 

Getting up from the spot he collapsed in sometime last night, Naruto looked around him to see how many monsters he managed to take down. It looked like a lot, he couldn't bother to count them all because most were in too many pieces. If he didn't know any better, he would have said that a wild, high-level monster had slotter them all. "Great, what should I do now?" Naruto wondered folding his arms, he heard a rustling in the bushes near him and turned to the sound sharply, "come out, I know you're there!" He waited for a while for the person to do as he said when a familiar face stepped out of the nearby shrubbery. 

"Uhm, hey...N-Naruto, it's just me," stated a boy in a black cloak. He walked out of the bushes fully, dusting himself off of the leaves as he stood before the blond.

Naruto eyed the boy for a minute trying to remember where he saw him from. Then his memory came back, "you! Who are you? And why do you know my name?" He asked sternly, he wasn't in the mood to play games.

The boy was a little startled by the tone that he was addressed with but didn't back down. "Uhm, I think you would remember me, I'm Shikamaru Nara, we went to school together in Knonha. Don't you remember me, Naruto?"

"Shikamaru?" Naruto looked at the pale toned boy closely, he stepped closer to him until he was inches away from the boy's face. Shikamaru pulled back a bit, feeling a little uncomfortable with the closeness, his cheeks tinted red. "Hmph," Naruto turned and walked away from the other boy, "sorry, I don't know you. You must have the wrong guy," he stated as he walked over to one of the dead mushroom monsters and pocked it with a stick wondering if it was okay to eat it. He was pretty hungry after all that fighting he did last night. The only reason he could take down so many monsters bare-handed was that Kurama taught him how to fight without a weapon when he was younger, he kept saying that it would be useful one day. He never thought that day would be yesterday.

Meanwhile, Shikamaru was watching Naruto pock the dead monster, a sad look on his face. Something inside him made his chest feel tight, he took a deep breath trying to let the feeling go. "Um, actually, I think you do," he tried once more.

"Yeah? What makes you say that?" Naruto asked continuing to pock the corpse, still deciding whether or not to cook it up now.

"Because we went to school together. We sat next to each other sometimes too," Shikamaru tried to ignore the tightness in his chest. But it wouldn't go away.

"So? Is that supposed to be enough to get me to believe you? I went to school with a lot of kids, all of them weren't nice to me in the least. What makes you think that I would remember one kid that sat next to me during all that time there now anyway?" Naruto glanced back at the raven-haired boy, he observed his black and white expression for a moment, "even so, who are you, huh?" 

"What?" Shikamaru looked up from the floor that his eyes had fallen to while Naruto was talking.

"I asked you who you are?" Naruto stood up and turned around, "are you to me, huh? Why should I remember I simple nobody that tried to bully me while I was still in school? Why should I know you? What makes you different from the others?" With every question he asked, Naruto would take a step towards Shikamaru, a menacing look on his face as he approached the thin boy, he was starting to get angry again, but no were as close as yesterday. "Who are you?"

"I-I-I'm Shikamaru Nara, I..." Shikamaru paused. He didn't know how to finish that sentence, he what? Wasn't one of the bullies? Wasn't like the others? He wanted to become friends with him now?... He had a crush on him? He couldn't just pick one of these to tell him and he was sure that if he did, Naruto, in this state, wouldn't accept it. He didn't know what to say at the moment, all those words he had practiced on the way over here. Everything he wanted to say was just stuck in his throat, he couldn't speak his mind. Although he knew he had to say something, he looked deep into Naruto dull blue eyes filled with rage and hate. He never noticed how blue they used to be until he saw how dull they had become. When did they become so dull in the first place? At the palace? Before he was summoned? In the academy? Maybe even before that, who knows. But the sight of those eyes made him realize what he needed to say now. "I'm joining your party."

"Ha, you? Aren't you worry about helping out the other heroes more?" Naruto stated, "or maybe this is out of pity."

"Neither, I'm joining your party because I want to help, that's all," Shikamaru stated firmly.

Naruto looked into Shikamaru's deep, dark eyes, he could see something there. He didn't know what emotion that was, he'd never seen it before. Behind the look of determination, there was another emotion there that Naruto couldn't place. Naruto folded his arms in front of him, "I don't need anyone in my party. But you can do what you want. I won't stop you, but I won't save you either. If you can't save yourself, then you will only be holding me back." He walked away from Shikamaru then, deciding that he was going to cook the mushroom monster after since he was so hungry now. Picking up the dead monster's body with one hand, he spoke to the other boy again, "whether it be a prince, a princess, a noble, or someone that's not even important in any world, I will make this promise. No one will get in the way of me living peacefully. I will not follow anyone's rule but my own. I will not live for anyone else, but myself. I have no one to love, and no one loves me, so if I simply die out on the battlefield, then I was simply too weak. I will do whatever it takes to become strong, and never let anyone that close to me ever again!"

* * *

**One week later**

During the time that Shikamaru had spent with Naruto after that day, he realized how serious Naruto's promise had been. He thought that he was only going to keep his distance from Shikamaru, but not only did it seem like Naruto only caught enough food for himself, but he also did everything else without telling him. Training, hunting, traveling in and out of town. Shikamaru would have to keep a close eye on the blond to make sure that he wasn't left behind. And it always seemed like Naruto was trying to leave everything behind while also trying to erase his own presents from the area he been in. In that sense, Shikamaru could say that Naruto was a true ninja now, but at the same time, he could say that Naruto was also becoming like a ghost. He showed him no emotions and anyone he meets was barely able to get two words out of him. Shikamaru wished that there was something he could do for him to change his lonely ways, but just as Naruto said, he will not allow anyone to become close to him. Now it's been a week and Naruto still hadn't spoken two words to him since that day. He would only follow behind Naruto, going everyone he went, like a shadow. Shikamaru tried to talk to him, but he would get ignored every time. As they spent time together, Naruto started to discover more features about his shield while he continued to train that he didn't feel like sharing with Shikamaru, only keeping it to himself. If Shikamaru were to guess one of the features of Naruto's shield had to do with plants and herbs, but that's all he could figure out with the blond being so silent all the time.

As for Naruto, he found out that his shield may not have been as useless as he thought. Even if he could use some of his ninja training to help himself in a fight, he could only go so far with simple hand to hand combat alone. He needed something to help him get stronger. If he was stronger, then he could start heading out to find dungeons to bring in some money. As of now, he only had the leftover coins that he hid in the secret pocket of his jacket the night before he got accused. It wasn't enough to live on, it would barely get him through the week if he didn't save it, he wanted to add to it quickly so he could sleep inside already. But in order to do that, he needed the money and he needed to get stronger, and the loop continued less he could break it. That was when he found out what else his shield could do. He had taken a seat against a tree earlier the previous day before, his shield lazily lying by his side, he wasn't doing anything but resting when the core of his shield did something to some of the plants he was sitting next to. From the looks of it, the plants were somehow improved to high-grade herbs, making him wonder if they were worth anything. With that thought in mind, Naruto decided to first see how the core improved the plants again and unlocked shield skill called: Plant Improvement. He repeated the process to some other plants, collecting a full basket of them, then he pulled up the hood of his jacket and snuck into town at dusk, followed by his persistent shadow, Shikamaru. He found the shop of an herbalist after some searching, "how much?" Was the only thing he asked after wordlessly entering the shop, walking up to the counter, and placing his full basket in front of the shop keeper.

The man behind the counter hadn't been paying much attention to them when the two came into his hop. He was busy looking through books up until he heard the horse voice of a child next to him. "Hm? Oh, what do we have here, did you bring these in?" The man asked as he looked up from his book to the boy that placed the basket on his desk. He noticed the other boy standing a few stepped behind the first and wondered if they come in together on an errand for their parents. That didn't really matter to him, although it was getting late out, their parents might start getting worried about them so. Looking back at the basket, he took out his magnifying glass to use his appraisal magic and was stunned, "these seem to be very valuable herbs of the highest grade. Anyone would be lucky to get even a handful of these when they're in season around here," he looked back at the hoodied boy, "where did you find these?" The boy shrugged his shoulders, he didn't seem to want to talk all that much so the shopkeep went back to checking through the valuable looking haul before him. "This would fetch a high price on the market," he sat back in his chair, "I can offer you...two hundred for the whole basket. Unless you can bring me more?"

Naruto looked at the basket for a moment, weighing his options before nodding.

"Really? So, you wouldn't be willing to tell me where you found them instead of two hundred fifty silver?" The shopkeeper asked, "it's a good deal, a kid like you could do a lot with that much."

Naruto shook his head, he wouldn't tell anyone. This man was trying to play him, but he won't allow it. He held up four fingers for the man to see and pointed to the basket. If this basket was as valuable as he claimed, he wanted to get the most out of this guy.

The shopkeep raised his eyebrow at the hoodied child. He couldn't even see the kid's face to know if he was being serious or not, "you know, it's kind of you to make deals with me when I can't even tell if you're being serious."

Naruto understood that the man wanted to see his face, he was reluctant to show it to others since he could be recognized by the whisker marks on his face. Yet, when the king practically threw him out of the castle back then, no reports were made of the Shield Hero having any identifying marks on his face. Hesitantly, Naruto removed his hood and looked up at the man, a serious look on his face, "four hundred for the whole basket."

"I see, you're quite young and bold, young man. However, I don't make enough in sales to guarantee that much if I could just go out and find this patch in the same place you did," the man behind the counter negotiated.

Naruto looked at the basket, "they're special, from far away." He looked at the man with a determined look, "I won't give them away so easily."

The man and Naruto stared at each other for a while, the shop owner wondered how this kid could find such high-grade herbs such as this. Just one or two steps could make a strong antidote or salve, if he knew where he got them from, he could make a trip up there himself later. Still, he couldn't deny that this kid had guts, he smiles, "alright, but how about we find a middle ground here? Would three hundred even sound good to you?' Naruto gave the basket a thoughtful looking as if he was thinking about leaving, "I will only be able to go up to three three hundred twenty. I can't really give you four hundred since I will be broke if I do."

Naruto thought about it, it was only slightly extra, but he nodded in agreement. 

"Grate, and if you can bring any more high-grade herbs you find into my shop first, I will gladly pay you well." The shopkeeper reached down behind his counter to retrieve the money before handing it to Naruto. "Here, I look forward to doing business with you again, young man," he gave the blond a smile as the child took the money.

"Fine, it's a deal," Naruto pocketed the money and turned to leave, "see ya later mister."

"Goodbye boys, get home safely," the shopkeeper waved to both boys as they exited the shop.

As Naruto and Shikamaru walked down the darkened streets after leaving the shop, Shikamaru followed behind the blond hero in silence. _"Haa, Shikamaru what are you even doing? This is the most time you've spent with him since he arrived in this world and you've only become his shadow? I can't talk to him, or I try and I don't respond to anything I say. I might as well have not even said anything in the first place. And the way he treats me is also like I'm not even there even though I follow him just about everywhere for the past week. I want to talk to him, but he doesn't listen, *sigh* this really is such a pitiful situation I'm in, isn't it? I can't help but wonder, if he knew my true feelings, would he accept me?"_

Their walk continued in silence down the dark alleyway. Neither saying a word as Shikamaru got lost in his own thoughts. The Nara was so lost that he didn't pay attention until he heard Naruto spoke, "who are you?" Shikamaru started walking in order to take a good look around to see who he was talking to, on the path ahead of them was a short, plump looking man standing a few feet away. 

The man smirked as he saw the two boys, he had a gleam in his eye when he spotted the shield attached to Naruto's arm. "You are the shield hero, yes? I have come to offer you my services." The man said as he took two steps towards Naruto and Shikamaru, "I have a feeling that I can help in your situation."


	7. Gaara

Naruto looked the man up and down. He was suspicious of him right away, and his offer didn't appease him. "What do you do that's so beneficial to me?" Naruto asked as he continued to eye the man. He could sense Shikamaru's tension behind him but didn't pay him any mind. He didn't want to deal with anything unnecessary, not when he had bigger things to worry about. He needed to find a way to level up quickly before that stupid wave thing happens. As it turns out, he can't escape his forced upon duty to this world even if he tried. When the wave happened, he and his party members will be transported to the sight of the battle whether he liked it or not, so in that regard, he needed to be prepared when that happened. However, his current sparing matches with the monsters of the forest aren't helping him out as much as he liked, he can only use his shield to fight and nothing else, so he would probably have to have someone fight for him. He did put some thought into letting that Shikamaru look-alike join his party officially, but he felt that he needed someone else on his side to deal some more damage to enemy forces. From what Shikamaru tried to explain to him about magicians during the past week was that even though they can be strong and useful, they still needed protection. Since Shikamaru also needed someone to guard while casting some of his more powerful spells, since the higher-level ones take a little longer to cast, Naruto didn't see the point in letting him join. Because Shikamaru had already stated twice now that he wanted to be apart of Naruto's party, the system has put him as [Awaiting Invit] even though Naruto wasn't really planning to let him join in the first place. Still, he allowed the other boy to follow him everywhere he went since it was clear that this Shikamaru wasn't going to leave him alone even if he asked. _"How troubling, if I can't use another weapon other than this shield, and he needs someone to protect him, the two of us aren't an effective team. However, if we had another person to help deal the damage and also watch both of our backs, then I can use both of them to get through the battle more easily than just doing everything alone. Yet, that's also another problem since no one is willing to help the shield hero out. Then I'm screwed if I can't find at least one more, I just need one."_

"Hehehe, from the look on your face, it seems like you're a very thoughtful guy. You use your head before you take a step, I must say that I don't see that in other kids your age," the man stated with a wide grin on his face. "However, you are not like other kids, are you, Sir Hero? You and your friend there are exceptions to the rules of this world and for that, I sought you out." 

Naruto narrowed his eyes at this man, "you sought me out? Why, what rumors have you heard?" He asked as he prepared himself for anything, he didn't think the man would attack, however, he wasn't going to allow himself to be caught off guard, "if you've heard about me, then why have you come?"

"Hehe," the mysterious man laughed again, "it is because I have heard about you that I came to have this talk." The man took a step back and to the side gesturing for the two boys to follow him, "please come so I can explain. I can guarantee you that I will be able to help you out of this tight situation that you've been throw into recently."

Naruto looked at the man for a second, not trusting him at all, but still, he was curious about the offer. He had a feeling that he could get something worth wild out of it, he's had this feeling before, a feeling that he tried to ignore and now he was in this situation. He would not make that mistake ever again. He walked over to the man, Shikamaru hesitantly followed behind him, he stopped to stand in front of the guy, "after you." The man chuckled and started walking in the direction he had come from, Naruto followed him, and Shikamaru followed behind his blond crush, silently wondering what they were getting themselves into. He didn;t like the look of this man, his shady face was one thing but the way that he spoke was another. It spoke volumes above the words that he stated and that put Shikamaru on edge, but even if he was to tell Naruto not to follow the man, the blond wouldn't listen to him, he had no reason to trust anyone here and he couldn't blame him. Shikamaru was only just recently starting to figure out what kind of like Naruto was living in the village when he wasn't forcing a smile onto his whiskered face. After following the man for a minute, they saw a striped tent come into view, it looked like a circus tent but the noise coming from it sounded less like a cheering crowd and more like restless animals. Shikamaru's assumption turned out to be true once the man pulled back a part of the tent to let them inside, there were cages stacked upon each other with different creatures clocked inside.

"Welcome to my office, gentlemen, have a look around and tell me if you see anything you like." The man smirked as the two boys walked into the tent filled with cages, "you see, I deal in the work of slave trading."

"Slave trading you say?" Naruto stated, pausing his steps in front of a cage with a creature that seemed more beast than man.

"Why yes, even in the Melramark kingdom, buying and selling slaves is about as natural as selling goods. They're good for housework, manual labor, and," the man had a sly look on his face, "other pleasures too if you like."

Naruto was silent for a long time as he looked at the creatures in their cages. He turned away from the cage he stopped in front of and continued to walk past a few more slowly, "do you have any that can fight?"

"Naruto, you can't be serious about buying slaves, can you?" Shikamaru asked worriedly.

"...Why not?" Naruto asked nonchalantly, "I need someone that is useful to me when I need them. I will not rely on useless things like hope to get me through life, that's a pipe dream if I ever heard one. I'm just going to have them do the fighting that I can't, they'll be useful for other things too between the waves, so think of it as making an investment into the future."

Shikamaru frowned, "but Naruto, you're meant to be a hero, buying someone's life like-"

"Hero? Hero?!" Naruto turned to face Shikamaru sharply, "the last time I was called such a word was when I got accused of raping some bitch that I don't even like! If you call me a hero one more time, this _hero_ will put you in your place, you understand, Nara?"

Shikamaru jumped a bit at the harshness of Naruto's tone. "U-uh, y-yeah...s-sorry, N-"

"If you understand, then stand there and be quiet. Or you can make yourself useful and help me look, whichever one you chose, I don't care. Just stay out of my way if you don't have anything important to say," Naruto turned away from Shikamaru without another word and continued walking. He made his way through the winding rows of cages until he came upon one that was covered, he heard some coughing coming from the sheet coving the cage. Curious, he walked over and pulled the sheet away from the cage, he wasn't expecting much when he saw a little boy dressing in rages and a slave collar staring back at him in fear. He guessed that the child couldn't be any more than five or six, his skin was so pale that it almost glowed amongst the darkest, even though it was covered in dirt and bruises. His eyes were a stunning shade of green that Naruto had never seen before surrounded by dark circles and his dark red hair was matted with mud. Naruto knelt down in front of the small boy, his body looked frail and his eyes filled with fear, but at the same time, he looked like a fighter, "how much is this one?" Naruto called out to the slave trader who walked over, as he was observing the little slave boy closer did he notice the ears and tails attached him the little one. The boy in the cage tried to back away from the front of the cage a little as the slave trader come near. 

"Him? He's just a little demihuman that I recently picked up," the slaver answered. "Demihumans are good with doing just about anything you want them to, and since I feel have a good feeling about you, I'll add on a bonus slave seal free of charge this time. However, if you're looking for a real fighter, I can show you this guy over here, he's an S rank fighter that's won many fights for his previous masters before coming here," the man stated gesturing to another cage close by.

Naruto looked back at the cage that the man was talking about. He saw the creature he walking about, the person looked like a man with a beaten-down spirit that just wanted to be set free. He knew that feeling all too well, if he had seen that person before he was summoned here, or even before he was chased out of the village, he might have felt like setting all of these slaves free. However, he wasn't the same Naruto as he was before, he wasn't going to allow simple pitty to hold him back anymore. "No," he got to his feet, "I don't have the luxury of spending top dollar for a good fighter. I'll have to train himself, so how much for him?"

The man nodded as he rubbed his hands together, "well, usually I would ask for a thousand for such a small fry like him. However, since he's sick, you can have him at a discount."

"Hmm, I see," Naruto turned his head back to the little boy, "what's your name." The little boy jumped when the blond's attention was on him again, Naruto could clearly see the fear in his eyes towards the people around him. _"He must have been through a lot before coming here, however..." _Naruto slammed his hand sown over the top of the cage making the little boy jump in surprise, _"I don't have time for all this."_

"U-uh, Naruto, maybe don't be so rough with him, he's probably already been through enough already." Shikamaru said walking closer to them, stood next to Naruto in front of the cage with a soft expression on his face, "I mean, to be in a place at such a young age. I can't imagine what kind of pain and torment he's been through already," he glanced at Naruto, "if you're going to buy him...then could you let me...maybe, help you train him?"

Naruto raised a brow at the request, he took his hand off the cage, "what, you? Really?" Shikamaru nodded, "fine, but don't waste time, but," he turned back to the little boy that was now close to tears inside the cage. "I still want his name, I can't go around just calling him 'it' or something," he addressed the little redhead, "so don't you have a name already? Answer me and I'll leave you to him to do the rest."

The boy was still hesitant in answering, Shikamaru knelt down in front of the cage with a kind smile on his face. "Hey, it's okay, just tell us your name."

"G-G-G-Gaara, m-m-my name i-is Gaara," the little boy stuttered out.

"Hmph, it's about time," Naruto as he took out the money pouch he got from the herbalist shop and a second pouch filled additional money. "Here, this should cover things right."

The slaver took the money with a big smile on his face. "Yes, yes, this will do just fine," he stated after checking both contents. He turned to gesture to another part of the tent, "I'll go get the key for the cage and collar. I'll also retrieve the seal to put on him," the man walked away to disappear behind a curtain for a second before returning. The newly named Gaara was released from his cage and chains. The slave seal was placed on him next, Shikamaru had to hold him in place while the seal was placing since it seemed to hurt. After that the slaver led them to his office where he drew up a document of sales for them to keep saying that Gaara was theirs legally, seeing how this kind of thing was normal in this world. "Now then, if you need any more workers, make sure you stop by to see me first, I'll be in the same place," he stated happily after all the papers were signed

Shikamaru was holding Gaara's hand, he couldn't help but notice how small the boy was for his age. He glances over to Naruto wondering what kind of training he was going to put this small boy through. Meanwhile, Naruto was shaking hands with the slaver as they said good boy, "I can't say that I am going to return here for sure in the future, but if anything involving this comes up later, I'll keep you in mind," he stated before he left the tent with Shikamaru and little Gaara. As they walked, he could feel Shikamaru's eyes on him, "what, you have something to say."

"Oh...um, no, not really I guess," Shikamaru started.

"But," Naruto could read the mood well enough to know that the other boy had something else he wanted to say.

"Well, I was just wondering," Shikamaru started, his attention was brought back to Gaara when he started to cough again. _"His cold seems to be really bad,"_ he thought to himself before turning back to Naruto. He found a bit of confidence to say what he couldn't before, but he had to say it in a way that wouldn't make it sound like pointless whining. "Gaara's sick if you're going to train him, he should be in better health or else he won't last, don't you think?"

Naruto paused his walking for a moment. Shikamaru paused behind him, he gave Gaara's hand a gentle squeeze as he waited for Naruto's response. Naruto turned around to face Shikamaru, they looked at each other for a long while, the blond could tell by Shikamaru's tone that he wasn't going to let this go, he looked down at Gaara who immediately shrank back and try to hide behind the person holding his hand. "Hmph, let's find a place to sleep tonight and finish this conversation inside," Naruto turned away from the two and continued walking down the street.

* * *

After finding and paying for a room in the cheapest inn they could find, they settled on getting one room with a single bed. Naruto figured that since the three of them didn't take up as much space as a grown adult, they wouldn't need too much to get settled in for the night. "Sit him on the bed and get me a cup with some hot water," Naruto instructed as he took out a small pouch he had filled with some of the high-grade herbs he had created earlier. 

"So I take it that you didn't give up all the herbs you made earlier," Shikamaru stated as he brought the cup for him before placing Gaara on the bed.

"Why would I do something stupid like that?" Naruto answered taking the cup from Shikamaru, he walked over to the nightstand next to the bed and put down the cup and pouch. He looked around for something to crush the herbs with, "do you have something I can crush this with?"

"Uh..." Shikamaru looked inside of his satchel, the same place he got the cup from and retrieved a small bowl and spoon. "Here, I don't have anything, but you can put them in this and us the spoon to crush them somehow."

Naruto looked at the added utensils with a frown but accepted them away and got to work on the herbs. As he was busy at the nightstand, Gaara nervously fidgeted on the bed, Shikamaru took noticed and felt bad for the little kid. Before he could say anything reassuring to the little redhead, Naruto spoke up, "I believe I also asked for what didn't I?" 

"Right," Shikamaru took the cup from the nightstand and left the room to fill it with hot water. He returned shortly after and placed the cup of hot water on the stand, "here."

Naruto took the cup and poured it into the bowl with the herbs he managed to mash-up. He stirred the contents of the bowl for a while before pouring the green liquid back into the cup, he walked over to the bed, cup in hand, "drink." Gaara looked at the cup hesitantly, "if you don't, you won't feel better, now drink," he held out the cup for Gaara to take with his hesitant hands. The boy looked at the cup cautiously, he glanced up at Naruto who looked at him sternly, Gaara started to shake as he looked back at the cup for a second before putting it to his lips and took a sip of the contents. It was bitter, surely it didn't take great, however, what medicine ever did? "Drink it all, don't leave a single drop behind."

"Naruto, you do realize that it's hot water and herbs right?" Shikamaru sighed, "a kid his age wouldn't want to drink that unless you force it down their throat or something."

"Is that so?" Naruto took the cup out of Gaara's hands suddenly, "open your mouth." Gaara could tell that something bad was about to happen, but he couldn't refuse his master as he did what was told of him, Naruto lifted the cup to Gaara's lips and tipped it, "drink." Gaara had no choice but to drink the hot, bitter liquid, silently hoping that he didn't do anything to get him into trouble such as throw up the medicine he was given, once the cup was finally empty, Nauto took a look inside the cup to make sure. When he was satisfied, he brought the cup over to the nightstand, collecting the other utensils of his amateur herbal medicine making, he turned to Shikamaru, "get him cleaned up. Let him use one of your shirts to sleep tonight and put him to bed, tomorrow we'll be gathering supplies for our training trip."

"Where are we going to go?" Naruto asked as he walked back over to the bed.

"I heard there are dungeons that hold the treasures in the world, I want to check one out to see what they're like. But before then, there's someplace that I've like to go first," Naruto stated as he started for the door. "Plus, we need to get some clothes and a weapon for him to be trained with. I'm thinking about a sword or a dagger," he stopped at the door, "something along those lines will do, I'll be accepting you both into my party, but if, and only if, you both can prove your worth to me." He opened the door, "don't disappoint me," he left the room after that.

Shikamaru watched the door for a while with a frown before frowning. He turned to Gaara who started coughing again, _"is it even a good idea to give him a bath tonight?" _He took off his cloak and satchel after retrieving a shirt from it, he walked over to Gaara and picked him up, he was surprisingly light for a five-year-old. He noticed how Gaara seemed to be less scared in his presence, "hey Gaara, don't be afraid of Naruto, he may act that way, but that's only because he's been hurt a lot, okay?"

"Hu-hurt?" Gaara turned his bright green eyes up to Shikamaru curiously, he couldn't believe what he was hearing. Naruto did seem scary to him, but he also smelled familiar. He could sense that his new master had a lot of power within him, he frowns as he leaned on Shikamaru's shoulder on their way to the bathroom, "okay."

Shikamaru looked down at Gaara, _"he really is light, I wonder when was the last time he had a proper meal?" _He put down the little boy to set the water to the right temperature for the bath, as they waited for the water to fill up, Shikamaru turned to Gaara. "Hey Gaara, I'm going to be right, there's something I forgot in the room, okay?"

"Okay," Gaara nodded as he watched Shikamaru. He watched the water fill the tub as he waited for Shikamaru to return, when he heard the door open again, he almost thought that Naruto would be standing there wondering why he wasn't bathed yet. Thankfully, it was only Shikamaru, the older boy held something behind his back that made Gaara curious. "What's that?"

Shikamaru brought his hands out from behind his back so Gaara could see him holding come cookies in one hand and a cup of water in the other. "Here, I don't think it's going to be enough, but you should eat something before you go to bed tonight."

Gaara looked at the cookies in surprise, he's never been able to eat them before, but now he was being offered them. This settled it, Gaara liked Shikamaru ten times more than Naruto right now, Shikamaru was nice while Naruto was mean. However, if what Shikamaru said about him was really true, then he felt bad for Naruto, for now, Shikamaru was the best. Gaara smiled at the Nara, "ca-can...can I really have this?" Shikamaru nodded, Gaara beamed, "thank you!" He stated as he took a cookie and it happily.

* * *

When Naruto returned to the room after having watched the cup, bowl, and spoon, he set them down on the nightstand to dry. He walked over to the bed to see Shikamaru and Gaara had already fallen asleep. Now that Gaara had a bath, his hair seemed to be a much brighter bed than before, and his pale skin shined like an angel. "Shikamaru did a good job then..." Naruto watched the two sleep for a moment before walking over to the bed, Shikamaru was sleeping against the wall with Gaara sleeping soundly at the center of the bed. Naruto took a seat on the bed next to Gaara, he gently brushed some of Shikamaru's hair out of his face, it seemed that the Nara allowed his hair out of its usual ponytail to sleep tonight. Was it because they were sleeping inside this time, Naruto couldn't say, but...he kind of liked to see his hair down like that while he was sleeping. Naruto frowned, "what am I thinking?" He whispered to himself under his breath as not to wake the other two, "I can't let anyone in again," he took in a deep breath as he took off his shoes. He let out a sigh and he laid down next to the other two, he glanced at them for a moment, taking in their sleeping faces for a second before turning away from them. "Never again," he whispered before closing his eyes to sleep.

.

.

.

**To be continue **


	8. Training

Naruto woke up extra early the following morning when he felt movement next to him. He opened his eyes when he heard someone whispering the words to a song he's heard in passing once before. Naruto turned his gaze towards the sound only to see that it was the Shikamaru look alike trying to comfort his new tag along. Honestly, Naruto wished he could go the rest of his time in this place alone, but then that would me that he would have to work even harder to stay alive. Especially during those wave things. Whatever they entailed, he would surely have to fight tooth and nail to stay alive here, it seems like it was going to be a much harder task since he had to not only look out for his own well being, but also for his slave and this look alike's as well. This irritated Naruto to some degree, but it was a necessary evil seeing as how he couldn't fight properly here. From what he had learned from his time using the shield in training, he could not use any other weapon other than the one he arrived with, mainly being this damn shield attached to his stupid arm. Naruto sighed harshly as he got up and sat on the edge of the bed facing away from the other two. Shikamaru stopped his singing when he noticed Naruto get up. Shikamaru was flustered for a second, so much so that his singing and rocking of the small redhead in his arms came to a sudden halt. This made Gaara pause to look up at Shikamaru before he noticed that Naruto has also gotten up, his body froze, were they being too loud just now, was the little boy's thoughts. At the same time, Shikamaru couldn't really think very well, his mind was going a mile a minute as his brain fully started to comprehend the situation. Here he was rocking a young boy back to sleep after a nightmare when the crush that was sleeping next to him just woke up, for some reason he felt like he was in a dream. However, only time will tell if it was bad or not, "N-N-Naruto-"

"Save it, I was going to get up now anyways," the blond stated coldly. He got to his feet and stretched his arms, "since you're both up now, it would be a good time to get out of here and start our training." He twisted his torso and shrugged his shoulders to get all the kinks out before walked over to grab his stuff, "make sure to get everything you came in with and take it with you when we leave, we won't be coming back." The blond walked away from the two on the bed, going over to the bathroom and washed his face with some water before drying it off. 

Meanwhile, Shikamaru was left on the bed still holding Gaara in his arms. For some strange reason, Shikamaru felt as though he had truly been woken up by Naruto just then. A moment ago, after Gaara had woken him up, he calmed the little boy down with a lullaby that his mother used to sing to him when he was small. He remembered it well because she would hum it quite often when she was doing housework as well, so he couldn't help but sing it to Gaara. Gaara, himself, seemed to need the song more than he thought because the little redhead was more than happy to cling onto Shikamaru as he sang. He really didn't know what kind of horrors this boy had gone through before they met him, but whatever it was, Shikamaru's heart went out to him. While the two of them were the only ones awake at the moment, Shikamaru couldn't shake the feeling that he was somehow a mother to this young, crying boy while his lover had fallen fast asleep on the bed. Did it felt almost too good to be true, Narut his lover? Yes, and Shikamaru didn't want to give his hopes up just in case Naruto turned out to be straight in the future, but then again, the moment got away from him and here they were. Shikamaru's thoughts were interrupted when Gaara started moving in his arms, "Shikamaru, we get up too?" 

Shikamaru looked down into Gaara's green pools with a smile on his face, he couldn't help it. He found Gaara to be adorable at this moment, he was so small and innocent, how could he not think he was cute? Then again, Shikamaru was always a sucker for cute things. "Yeah, let's get up now," he said softly as he made his way off the bed, he lifted Gaara off the bed as well before helping him into some new clothes. Shikamaru had taken some time to watch Gaara's clothes while Naruto and Gaara were still asleep, he felt that Gaara wouldn't be able to move around in well in a fight without flashing someone his little cheeks. Plus, even though Shikamaru was fairly small himself, his shirt still fit Gaara two sizes too big, "here, I washed your clothes last night and let them dry overnight." Gaara's clothes were like rags, even though they still resembled clothing, they were still torn up pretty badly, he wondered if it was possible to ask Naruto to let him buy Gaara some new clothes. Of course, Naruto had made it clear that he was not going to buy useless things, so new clothes were probably on his list of useless things to get with their low funding. Besides, with the exception of a small hole or two that needed to be attached up, Gaara's clothes were still in somewhat good shape. Once Gaara was dressed, Shikamaru nodded approvingly, "alright, all set," Shikamaru got up and put Gaara to sit on the bed, but then he realized, "you don't have any shoes.'

"I haven't had shoes in a while," Gaara said nonchalantly as he kicked his feet lazily against the bed. Shikamaru gave him a sad look that Gaara didn't quite like. He didn't get to see Shikamaru's face when he was bought at the mean man's tent, but when he was getting his bath, he thought that Shikamaru's smile was nice. He preferred to see Shikamaru smile rather than frown, Gaara placed a hand on the side of Shikamru's cheek, "I'm fine without shoes."

At that moment Naruto came out of the bathroom with a disapproving look on his face. "No, you are not fine without them," the other two turned to him when he said that, Naruto was looking directly at Gaara as he spoke, "if you are going to be fighting with me, then you need to be healthy. I can't have you cutting up your feet without shoes, so what we're going to do is find a way to make us some money quickly. Then we are going to buy you some shoes and some new clothes, but you will have to work hard for those things, understand?"

Gaara nodded his head and hopped off the bed showing Naruto that he was ready, "ready." The little boy said as he waited for orders. Although Naruto seemed cold, something inside of him told him that he was the same as the blond, or the blond was the same as him. Either way, Gaara felt a connection towards Naruto that he's never felt before, not even in his previous life before he woke up here. He remembered back to that day, as it turned out, when he awoke, he was already being taken away somewhere, he knew that he was running at the time, but he couldn't remember much more than that. Ever since then, he had been having horrible dreams of things attacking him, scary things of mysterious origin that he's never seen before. It triggered a fear in him that shook him to his core while he watched people he's never even met, or remember meeting get slattered before him. It was all a confusing time that made his head hurt, but he sometimes wonders where he came from and how he ended up here, in this situation.

"Gaara? Are you alright?" Shikamaru placed a mental hand on Gaara's shoulder since the little boy seemed to have gotten lost in thought just now.

"Huh? I'm fine," Gaara said coming back to the here and now. 

Naruto walked over to take a closer look at his little slave, he disliked knowing that he owned a person now. This was a human being, right? Despite the ears and tail, this was a person with their own thoughts and memories, sure it was curious to see a person like him, but he's seen the Kyuubi's human form. That reminded him, he was still missing Kurama's presence around him. Naruto sighed, he looked Gaara over for a second, he placed a hand on his forehead then one on Gaara's to check his temperature, "hmm, you're still a little warm, but you'll live." He took his hand away and stood up straight, "we're going to be training hard so that we can prepare properly for the upcoming wave, so that means that you can't get sick again, got it. Try you're best not to slow me down and I'll treat you well, understood?" 

Gaara cocked his head to the side a bit, he's never heard his previous master's tell him this before, but he's never met a master like this. Naruto was different somehow, even though he was harsh to him, he didn't want him to be like the others, but that didn't mean that he would say this way all the time. Gaara nodded, "yes, understood."

Naruto nodded again and turned towards the door, "good, we have a lot of work to do. From here, we'll be on the road a lot, so you better get used to sleeping outside. Both of you."

"Understood," Shikamaru said getting to his feet fully. He went and grabbed his stuff, making sure that nothing was missing from his possessions before pulling on his satchel and clock. He turned towards Naruto after taking Gaara's hand in his, he couldn't help it, he felt like holding the little boy's hand at the moment. He wanted something to make him feel grounded at this moment, and that hat happened to be Gaara. The trio left the room shortly after and made their way out of the inn just in time to miss the two thugs that were planning to rob them while they slept. The trio made their way into the forest and started their journey to find their first dungeon.

* * *

**Meanwhile In Konoha**

Hiruzen stood in front of the window in his office with a grim look on his face. It had been about three long months since the Nara heir had gone missing. It has been about two months since he last saw Naruto. And no one has a single word or had a single sighting of either boy within the time of their disappearance. It made him wonder if this was some kind of sign that it was time for Naruto's secret to finally be revealed. Naruto was tortured by the same villagers that we're now celebrating his possible death the same way they celebrated his father's supposed heroics. Hiruzen knew that it was time to put a stop to all of their joyous celebrating with the truth that they lacked. The old age didn't expect much to come out of him doing that, then again, he would be happy to put an end to the miss information that was allowed to spread all this time. A ninja appeared in front of his desk, facing his back since the kage was looking out the window at the moment. Hiruzen turned his head enough to look down at the shinobi, "what do you have to report?" He asked the man kneeling before his desk. 

"Lord Hokage, we were finally able to track down Naruto Uzumaki's and Shikamaru Nara's last wearables on the days that they went missing. It seems that the antic shop that Shikamaru was last seen in was run by an elderly man who moved to the village this year. He used to live in a small village near Konoha. His move from his village to ours was said to be able to spend more time with his grandchildren. This man also ran an old library in that village and brought some of his older books, amongst other things, to the village to make a living here. It was at his shop and his former library that both boys seemed to have disappeared since Naruto Uzumaki was last seen walking around that village two months prior. That is about as much information that we were able to gather from witnesses in the area around that time, sir. No other information could be gathered at this time."

Hiruzen was silent for a long time before he let out a long sigh, "so there is no way of knowing if either boy is still alive or dead, is there?" 

"No, sir," the shinobi replied.

"And you still can't identify if this was some kind of kidnapping from another village?" Hiruzen asked as he turned to face the man.

"No sir.," was the reply.

Hiruzen nodded, he thought for a second, if there was no way of knowing if either boy was alive or dead, then there was still hope. He was both happy and sad about that because hope was a double-edged sword, it could be both good and bad to hold on too. He sighed once more before walking around his desk, "very well then. I want you to tell the others to keep an eye out for anything suspicious concerning the two boys. Fro now, however, I would like to gather the people of the village to make an important announcement."

"Yes, sir," the shinobi nodded his head and disappeared as suddenly as he had appeared. 

Hiruzen looked around his office for a second before his eyes landed on the pictures of the four Kage's. His eyes lingering on the Yondime Hokage a second longer, his smiling face and bright blue eyes were the spitting images of Naruto, that is when he actually smiles. When Naruto frowns, he looks slightly more like his mother, Kushina Uzumaki, the former princess of Uzushio. Hiruzen shook his head sadly, "I wish I could have taken better care of him when I had the chance, but it looks like I've missed that chance. Now I only wish to apologize to both of you and him for my lack of action," he turned away from the picture and left the office. The people would be gathering soon enough and he had a lot of explaining to do.

* * *

**Back to Naruto**

Naruto, Shikamaru, and Gaara made their way through the forest until he found a good spot for them to start training. He taught Gaara the basics of taijutsu, it seems that the only other way for him to fight was using his body and shield. He would have liked weapons better since they allowed him to attack from long range, but that wasn't what he was most upset about. It seems that whatever this statute magic thing was, it didn't seem like it had a chakra meter on it anywhere, he would have liked it to show him if he could use chakra here or not but he only found a blank space for where something extra could be leveled up and there was no name for it in the stats. Naruto was frustrated about that, but since there wasn't much he could do about that other than try to level up his stuff, which he actually didn't mind doing. Seeing as how all Naruto ever did before trying to graduate from the Academy was study and train, so training for long periods of time was natural for him. He made Gaara and Shikamaru both learn his fighting style for good measure, drilling it into them day in and day out until they could do it on reflex. As he said, he would not carry weak and useless things around with him, so he made sure to train both of them into the dirt. Currently, the trio was heading to a dungeon that was located near a small town that was a few day's walks from the inn they were staying that night. On their way, Naruto made sure to set aside some time for them to train in some taijutsu after lunch before they started walking again. They made little stops for much else except food, sleep, and training, Naruto wanted to get to the dungeon quickly to build up Gaara's battle experience fast. Along the way, Shikamaru told Naruto about magic and how it worked, Naruto was curious if he could fight with magic as it was basically like chakra in his mind. It was something that he wanted to try out soon, that's for sure.

They were halfway to the dungeon when Shikamaru brought up a question. "Hey, Naruto, if Gaara is going to be doing most of the fighting that you can't, wouldn't it be good to get him a weapon soon?" The young mage asked curiously. 

Naruto nodded, "it would," he nodded in agreement, "but not just yet." The blond got up from his resting spot and walked over to the little redhead who was finishing up his portion of the rabbit stew that Shikamaru made. The little boy looked up at the blond silently, ocean blues looked into pools of green, "Gaara, you can control sand, can't you?" 

"Eh? I-" Gaara started but was cut off when Naruto knelt down in front of him. He looked deep into the boy's green eyes making Gaara back up a little.

"This," Naruto reached down to the ground between them and picked up a small bit of sand in his hand without breaking eye contact. He lifted his hand with the sand in it so Gaara could see, SHikamaru was watching the encounter curiously Naruto released the sand from his hand slowly, but instead of falling to the ground, the sand flowed towards Gaara as if he was a sand magnet, "I have been noticing this during the times when we were training together. Any time any portion of sand or dirt was sent your way, it wouldn't just hit you, it would surround you. Almost as if you were it's master."

Gaara had a look of surprise on his face, he put down his now empty bowl to take a close look at what the sand was doing. He picked up a handful of the sandy dirt in his small hands, lifting it up to his face and letting it fall out freely. The sand fell from his hand and swirled around the redhead with the rest of the sad, that was when he noticed that more of the loose sand around him was starting to lift from the ground slightly. "Whoa," Gaara looked around him, looking at the sand as it rose from the earth, he smiled a little, he tossed his hand out as a test and the sand followed the direction. He gasped a little when he pulled his hand back and the sand followed hid direction again before falling back down. He turned back to Naruto with a happy smile, he was happy that he could control the sand as his new master said, but his smile faded. "Master, why can I control sand?"

Naruto stood to his feet, shook his head as he folded his arms, "I don't quite know why, yet. If I was back home, I probably could've asked a good friend of mine, but he's lost right now. I don't know where to find him or how to get back home right now, so I'm just as lost as you, kid...But, that doesn't mean that we can't use this to our advantage," Naruto smirked.

"Huh? How are you planning to use sand to your advantage, Naruto?" Shikamaru asked as he came over to them after putting a lid over the pot he used to cook the stew in. 

Naruto gave him a smug smirk, "I'm going to train him how to use the sand as a weapon. Sand it all around us, it's basically tiny rocks that were ground up, plus it's all around us so it's free, which is what we need right now. Not to mention," he turned away from Shikamaru to look around, he walked over to a small boulder nearby. He placed his palm on the smooth surface of the giant rock as he made a fist with his other hand, "if we really want to hit the enemy hard, then we'll have to make a special blend of sand that is twice as hard." He braced himself as he let his fist fly into the side of the bolder, he hit the bolder with everything he got and the rock broke into several smaller pieces. Naruto looked down at his handiwork proudly, "this with be the base of the sand that Gaara will start training with from now on. He'll use both sand and weapons in a fight," he turned back to Shikamaru and Gaara who was looking at him with shocked expressions, but it didn't surprise Naruto one bit. He knew he was strong, he trained in taijutsu with Lee who always practiced hitting hard objects with his fist during his training, so Naruto adapted that to his training as well and look at the results he got. Although he did feel that he could have broken the rock with less force if he was back in his world, he knew for a fact that he could do it, but something about this place made him feel...weak. He frowned and pulled up his stats window when he first set off on his own, he remembered feeling the need to train was strongest then, the urge wasn't as strong now though. "Huh, looks like my stats have gone up a bit since the last time I checked it."

"Really? May I see?" Shikamaru asked coming close with Gaara in tow, he looked down at the black pop-up screen that appeared in front of Naruto. He had never seen anything like this before, "what is this?"

"This is a statues screen it shows me my readings. Things like strength, abilities, and skills that I've gained. I can level these things up as I wish, but it seems like I've not leveled up much of my shield's ability, while my physical and mental have been rising well enough." Naruto explained as he tapped the screen, the clicked on the shield's abilities that seemed t only have on thing opens out of the four other spots that were left blank. "Hm, I wonder what could go in here..." he wondered looking at the empty spaces.

"Who knows...what's this thing?" Shikamaru asked pointing to a lone stats bar that looked to be a quarter full, there was no name to label it like the others.

"That's what I've been wanting o know for a while." Naruto wondered out loud, he hummed for a second before clicking on the quarter filled statues bar. The bar opened another window over the first window, this window was labeled with three question marks slash 'magic'. "Hm, this is new..." Naruto scanned the page to see some other things in this new window that he didn't know their uses, the king didn't say anything about this when he was explaining the statues magic to them. Naruto was curious but he didn't want to rack his brain about something he didn't have the answers to yet, so he closed both windows and turned to Gaara. "Well, nevermind that, all you have to do is focus on your training, and luckily for you, I'm in a somewhat good mood today, so we'll be resting here for a while longer. But that doesn't mean that you can slack off on your training because of that, I'm going to use my fist to break the rocks around here into smaller pieces. After that, we're going to ground them down into sand so you can start practicing with them. While I do that, you can play wit te regular sand to get a feel with how far your limits go, understand?"

Gaara nodded, Understood," for some reason, he felt happy to be using the sand, if not to play with, but also to help his master. So far, Naruto has been very different from the two other masters he's had before, he didn't hit him or yelled at him for no reason. Gaara felt that he would get stronger under Naruto and that was a good feeling to have. He was tired of being sick, of being weak, so Gaara was prepared to help Naruto as much as he could. Gaara ran off to do as Naruto asked, he dug up some sand here and there and focused on making it follow his will.

Meanwhile, Shikamaru was still curious about how Naruto was planning to get Gaara to fight with the sand. It was sand. Other than moving it around earlier, Shikamaru didn't understand the fighting element just yet, but if Gaara was really able to control large amounts of sand at a time, then he could make a sand shield, he could use it to attack, _'maybe there was some good use in this after all." _Shikamaru smiled when he saw Gaara playing instead of training, even though he was technically still training, he turned to Naruto say something but was stopped when he saw how focused Naruto was. The was still a large part of the bolder that didn't break before, Naruto looked so focused that Shikamaru didn't want to break his concentration. He stayed silent as he watched the blond bring his fist back again before launching it forward with everything he had. The rock broke into smaller pieces, Naruto gathered up all the small pieces into a pile and started repeatedly punching the pile of rocks over and over again. Looking between the two that were giving their all, Shikamaru was starting to feel left out. He shook his head, "I can't be the only one not doing my best," Shikamaru walked over to his bag and took out his book of spells and started studying it

**The following day**

Gaara had stayed up all night practicing with the sand so he barely got any sleep at all. Naruto managed to stay up half the night turning rocks into sand for Gaara. Shikamaru stayed up as late as he could studying but was the first of the three to turn in for the night. He tried to get Gaara to get some sleep, but the little boy was determined to be useful to Naruto by practicing with the sand for as long as he could. Shikamaru couldn't blame him for that, the boy had been mistreated and despite Naruto's usually cold stair, the blond was actually kind to the boy. Shikamaru was happy about that because he did not want Gaara's childhood to be any harsher than it already was. As for Naruto, when Shikamaru woke up that morning, he couldn't find any sign of Naruto, and the spot that Naruto was working in was clear of all rocky debris. Gaara had fallen asleep next to Shikamaru at some point during the night, he looked very tired so Shikamaru didn't bother waking him, he simply covered the boy wit his cloak before going o to find Naruto. The blond wasn't that hard to find, actually, as the Nara found him sitting under a tree with his back leaning against the bar in a peaceful slumber. Shikamaru didn't see any more broken pieces of rock lying around him so he wondered what he was doing so far away from the camp they set up the previous day. Shikamaru silently makes his way over to the sleeping blond to see if he would wake up, but when he was standing right in front of him the blond stayed asleep, "he must have been really tied then. The Nara smiled as he squats down to be at eye-level with the sleeping boy, he smiled softly as he watched him sleep for a bit, something he had never been able to do before. He found that Naruto looked very at peace when he was sleep, he wished he could see this side of Naruto more often, the blond looked just as, if not more, tired than Gaara. He looked over Naruto's person and noticed that his fist appeared to be bleeding, "so, you really stayed up all night trying to make sand?"

There was no response to his question, but Shikamaru didn't mind. He quickly got up and ran back to their camping ground, he looked through his bag and retrieved a first aid kit before hurrying back over to Naruto's side. Gently, he took one of his hands and started dressing his wounds, when he was done, he moves on to the other hand before putting his stuff away, but Naruto didn't wake up during all that time. They were still close enough to came to get back to in almost no time at all, so Shikamaru felt safe enough to sit next to Naruto while he slept, he watched his sleeping face for a while. His lips looked so inviting that he wanted to lean forward and kiss him before he could stop himself, his lips were already onto his. Naruto's lips were soft, just as Shikamaru hoped it would be, "Shikamaru..." Naruto's voice rang in Shikamaru's ears like an alarm, the Nara backed away from the blond to see that his eyes opened when he didn't notice. 

"Naruto! I-I-" Shikamaru started as Naruto sat up properly while Shikamaru stuttered to find a way to explain what he was doing "um, y-y-you see, I-I w-was j-j-just, um-" 

"Shut up, I know what you were doing," the blond said as he got up to stand. Shikamaru quickly stood up with him still trying to explain himself. 

"N-n-no i-it isn't l-like I-I'm a p-pervert or anything, I-I-I just," Shikamaru was looking down at his feet to avoid looking at Naruto for the moment. Because of that, he missed the look on Naruto's face before the blond reached over and pulled Shikamaru into a deep kiss of is own, surprising the raven-haired boy. Shikamaru was stunned, more than stunned, he was shocked, it felt like a bolt of lightning went down his spine and back up again. The action woke him from his scattered thoughts and let him speechless when Naruto released him he couldn't utter a word. What just happened? Was this real? Did that just happen? These were the questions that kept reappearing in his mind over and over again as he stood there, motionless, without words, lost.

Naruto watched him for a second or two before turned away from him, "well then, now that you got your kiss, maybe you can focus more on the here and now. Hopefully, that will keep you from watching me in my sleep or so long again," the blond stated as he dusted off his clothes and made his way back to the camp.

Shikamaru's mind was processing the situation much slower than usual now. That kiss really seemed to affect him in his way and was making him fall ineffective. It was when Naruto had disappeared behind the bushes that SHikamaru finally figured out that Naruto knew he was being watched in his sleep. Shikamaru's face turned bright red as he wised he could remind time to take back that kiss, but it was already too late now. _"What was I even thinking?!!" _Shikamaru thought as he turned to head back to the camp while still trying to camp himself after Naruto's sudden actions. 

**To be continued...**


End file.
